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Griffis 


Influence  of  the  ^Netherlands 
in  the  Making  of  the  xiinglish 
Coimnonwealth  and   the 
American  Renublic 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


THE 


INFLUENCE  OF  THE  NETHERLANDS 


IN    THE    MAKING   OK   THE 


ENGLISH    COMMONWEALTH 


AMERICAN  REPUBLIC, 


NOTICE    OF    WHAT    THE    PiLGRIMS    LEARNED    IM    HOLLAND,   THEIR    TREAT 

MENT    BY    THE    GOVERNMENT    AND    PEOPLE,  AND    ANSWERS 

TO    CRITICISMS     MADE    UPON    THE   PROPOSED 

Delfshaven  Memorial. 


A  PAPER 

READ   BEFORE  THE   BOSTON   CONGREGATIONAL  CLUB, 

Monday  Evening,  Oct.  26,  1S91, 

By   WM.  ELLIOT 'GRIFFIS,  D.D., 


Chairma 


N  OF  TJ^E  Delfshaven  Memorial  Committee,  and  printed  by 
their  order. 


Copies  of  this  Pamphlet  may  be  obtained  of 
De  WOLFE,  FISKE  &  CO.,  365  Washington  Street, 

BOSTON,   MASS. 
Price,  15  Cents  by   Mail. 


InSTTK.OID'CJCTOK.^ir  INToxEj^'^       Vj 


The  writer  in  sending  forth  this  pamphlet,  written  since  his  return  from  a  visit  to  the 
Netherlands  and  the  eastern  counties  of  England,  cannot  thank  by  name  all  the  kind  friends, 
Dutch,  Knglish,  and  American,  who  have  given  him  hints  and  suggestions,  or  answered 
his  questions.  He  must,  however,  especially  thank  the  Rev.  Daniel  Van  Pelt,  D.D.,  of 
New  York  City,  Rev.  John  Todd,  D.D.,  of  Tarrytown,  and  Douglas  Campbell,  Esq.,  of 
Schenectady,  N.  Y.  In  the  forthcoming  volume  of  the  latter,  entitled  "The  Puritan  in 
England,  Holland,  and  America,"  will  be  found  fully  argued,  illustrated,  and,  I  believe, 
demonstrated,  certain  claims  as  to  American  history  at  which  the  writer  has  in  this  paper 
only  hinted.  It  is  a  matter  of  regret,  also,  that  lack  of  time,  space,  and  money  does  not 
permit  the  writer  to  increase  the  size  and  expense  of  this  pamphlet,  by  giving  in  full  the 
references  to  books  and  authors  which  furnish  the  basis  of  authority  for  the  statements 
made.  In  a  course  of  reading  begun  some  years  ago,  when  pastor  of  the  Reformed 
Protestant  [Dutch]  Church  in  Schenectady,  N.  Y.,  and  lately  refreshed  by  a  visit  to 
Europe,  the  writer  has  consulted  the  historians  of  English  Nonconformity,  and  the  local 
annalists  of  the  eastern  counties  of  England,  as  well  as  the  standard  writers,  such  as  Hume, 
Macaula}',  Hallam,  Freeman,  Stubbs,  Green,  Carlylc,  Froude,  Maine,  Masson,  Goadby, 
Thorold  Rogers,  de  Gibbins,  Sotherden  Burns,  etc.,  besides  the  old  authorities,  Strype, 
Parker,  Hollinshead,  Lord  Somers,  and  many  pamphlets  and  monographs  of  the  period 
between  15S0  and  1640.  In  matters  concerning  Holland, — the  dark  side  of  the  moon  to  most 
English  and  American  historians,  since  among  the  great  number  of  writers  on  England' 
American,  or  Congregational  history,  a  critical  knowledge  of  Netherlandish  historv  is  as 
rare  as  a  Dutch  library  or  shelf  of  books  in  an  American  or  English  college, —  I  have  little 
obligation  to  acknowledge  to  writers  in  English.  Besides  consulting  Carleton,  Davies, 
Brodhead,  Steven,  Motley,  the  Pilgrim  autographs,  and  the  printed  works  of  the  great 
illuminator  of  Pilgrim  history,  the  late  Dr.  H.  M.  Dexter,  I  have  depended  on  the  state- 
ments of  Wagenaar,  Bor,  Groen  Van  Prinsterer,  the  Ryks  (national  Dutch)  archives,  and 
the  help  so  kindly  afforded  me  by  Dutch  scholars  both  in  the  Fatherland  and  in  America. 

Unable  to  boast  one  drop  of  either  Dutch  or  Pilgrim  blood,  the  writer  herein  sets  forth, 
as  a  student  of  history,  some  of  the  results  of  his  reading  and  reflection,  and  of  those  experi- 
ences of  the  Dutch  in  America,  Japan,  and  Europe,  into  which  Divine  Providence  has  led 
him.  The  outcome  of  researches,  necessarily  critical  in  their  nature,  is  a  more  profound 
admiration  and  reverence  for  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  and  mothers  alike — and  the  attainment 
of  full  faith  in  both  the  absolute  truth  and  personal  sincerity  of  Governor  Bradford's 
two  messages  from  Plymouth  to  the  Dutch  at  Manhattan,  March,  1627,  and  Oct.  i,  Anno 
1627 :  "Acknowledging  ourselves  tied  in  a  strict  obligation  unto  your  country  and  state, 
for  the  good  entertainment  and  free  liberty  which  we  had,  and  our  brethren  and  countrymen 
yet  there  have  and  do  enjoy  under  your  most  honorable  Lords  and  States;  "  "  for  which  we 
are  bound  to  be  thankful,  and  our  children  after  us."  \Vhat  if  it  has  taken  "nearly  two 
centuries  and  a  quarter  to  discover"  what  all  the  Pilgrims  knew  and  Bradford  has  recorded? 
Is  it  ever  too  late  to  do  a  good  thing?  Not  so  thought  the  Rev.  Dr.  Richard  Salter  Storrs. 
In  his  oration  on  "The  Puritan  Spirit,"  in  Boston,  December  iS,  1SS9,  he  said  :  "A  monument 
has  been  raised  to  them  (the  founders  of  New  Enghmd)  at  Plymouth,  on  a  spot  near  which 
they  landed.  It  is  wholly  fitting  that  another  be  raised,  as  is  now,  I  iearn,  proposed,  on 
the  site  of  their  departure  from  the  Old  World  to  the  New.  The  two  should  stand  as 
answering  towers, — Martello  towers, — commemorating  hearts  that  were  as  resonant  iron, 
and  words  that  were  hammers;  between  which  the  unfailing  wires  of  reverent  remembrance 
shall  bind  not  Delfshavcn  and  Plymouth  alone,  but  all  the  hearts  fearless  of  man  and 
s.ti-adfast  for  righteousness  in  both  the  continents."  vv.  li.  g. 


Ft? 


Mr.   President  and  Members   of  the  Boston    Congregational 
Club: — 

On  the  24th  of  February,  1889,  your  servant  was  appointed 
by  the  President  of  this  Chib,  Mr.  Charles  Carleton  Coffin, 
chairman  of  a  committee  of  five  gentlemen  charged  with  the 
inauguration  of  an  enterprise  designed  to  do  honor  to  both  the 
Pilgrims  and  their  hosts  in  Holland.  Efforts  were  at  once  made 
to  enlist  public  interest  and  support  of  the  enterprise.  Criticisms, 
however,  came  from  an  unexpected  quarter,  and  historical  ques- 
tions were  raised  which,  for  their  settlement,  required  an  exam- 
ination of  the  sources  of  authority.  There  were  special  reasons 
existing  then,  which  no  longer  obtain,  why  the  prosecution  of 
the  Delfshaven*  Memorial  enterprise  should  remain  in  abeyance. 
The  Committee  of  the  National  Congregational  Council,  charged 
with  the  erection  of  a  tablet  to  the  memory  of  John  Robinson,  to 
be  affixed  to  St.  Peter's  Church  in  Leyden,  had  not  yet  finished 
their  work.  The  right  of  way  was  therefore  cheerfully  accorded 
to  those  who  had  first  proposed  to  honor  the  noble,  self-effacing 
pastor  and  leader. 

For  the  settlement  of  the  historical  questions  raised  by  critics 
of  the  larger  enterprise  inaugurated  by  this  Club,  it  was  necessary 
that  those  who  defended  it  should  not  be  content  with  second- 
hand opinions,  but  form  their  judgments  independently,  after 
examination  of  the  sources  of  authority.  Accordingly  the  writer 
made  a  special  trip  to  the  Netherlands  and  to  the  eastern 
counties  of  England,  spending  a  month  in  each  of  these  countries, 
seeking  new  facts,  and  refreshing  the  memory,  also,  of  a  line  of 
readings  begun  some  years  ago  and  continued  to  the  present  time. 
The  result  has  been  the  confirmation  of  judgments  to  which,  as  a 
student  and  independent  investigator,  he  came  some  years  ago. 

Waiving  all  further  introduction,  I  shall  enter  at  once  upon 
my  theme,  which  is,  The  Inffuence  of  the  Netherlands  in  the 
Making  of  the  English  Commonwealth  and  the  American  Repub- 
lic ;  the  outlines  of  which  are  as  follows  : — 

I.  The  influence  of  the  Netherlands  upon  England  generally. 
*The  modern  spelling,  Deli'shaven,  is  used  in  this  papei\ 


.'57948! 


II.  Upon  that  part  of  England  from  which  the  settlers  of 
New  England  almost  wholly  came  ;  viz.,  the  eastern  counties. 

III.  Upon  the  Pilgrims  while  in  Holland,  with  answers  to 
special  criticisms. 

IV.  Upon  the  tens  of  thousands  of  Englishmen,  whether 
refugees,  soldiers,  merchants,  or  scholars,  who  lived  in  the 
Dutch  Republic  from   1580  to   1640. 

V.  Upon  Cromwell,  his  army,  the  English  Parli  imcntarians, 
and  the  temporarv  Republic,  or  Commonwealth. 

VI.  Upon  the  Puritan  settlers  and  political  life  of  New 
England. 

VII.  Upon  local,  state,  and  national  government  in  this 
American  Republic,,  both  in  the  colonial  and  the  constitution- 
making  epochs,  with  a  final  glance  at  the  relations  between  Hol- 
land and  the  United  States. 

At  the  opening  of  the  sixteenth  century,  when  in  1509  Henry 
VIII.  ascended  the  throne,  the  contrast  in  wealth,  culture,  and 
civilization  between  England  and  the  Netherlands  was  as  much 
to  the  disadvantage  of  the  former,  as  the  contrast  in  point  of 
political  and  commercial  importance  is  to-day  the  reverse. 

Then  in  the  fine  arts,  music,  civic  architecture,  painting, 
science,  learning,  agriculture,  inventions,  organized  industries, 
navigation,  finance,  political  science,  and  local  freedom,  the 
j^eople  of  the  Netherlands  were  among  the  leaders  of  Europe. 
Feudalism,  which  had  so  long  checked  the  growth  of  popular 
liberty  elsewhere,  had  taken  less  hold  of  Holland  than  of  any 
'country  in  Europe.  In  Frisia,  the  original  home  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxons  and  the  largest  of  the  Dutch  provinces,  it  had  never  been 
known.  In  other  parts  of  the  Netherlands  the  development  of 
town  life,  in  the  form  of  municipal  republics,  checked  the  growth 
of  feudal  tyranny.  The  walled  cities,  so  much  richer  and  more 
numerous  than  in  England,  were  fortresses  of  local  freedom. 
Ilallam  well  says  that  "  their  self-government  goes  beyond  any 
assignable  date."  The  clergy  had  never  been  allowed  to  become 
one  of  the  estates  of  the  realm,  so  that  the  Dutch  were  saved  from 
spiritual  tyranny  petrified  in  the  form  of  a  king,  or  house  of 
lords,  or  legislature.  In  all  Europe  the  principle  cujus  regio^ 
cujus  rellglo  was  the  rule.  The  Dutch  were  the  first  to  reverse 
this  rule,  that  the  people  must  be  of  the  same  religion   as  the 


ruler,  and  to  declare  that  the  ruler  must  be  of  the  same  religion 
as  the  people.  Thev  were  the  Hrst  to  stand  for  the  principle, 
and  to  fight  for  it  and  secure  it,  "  No  taxation  without  the  con- 
sent of  the  taxed."  They  were  the  first  to  teach,  by  revolt 
against  despotism,  that  power,  under  God,  originates  with  the 
people  ;  that  government  exists  for  nations,  and  not  nations  for 
government.  In  many  respects  Holland  is  the  land  of  first  things 
in  modern  Christian  civilization.  Here  art  was  first  made  the 
servant  of  the  home,  glorifying  the  things  of  common  life,  and 
the  people  rather  than  kings  and  nobles.  Here  science  was 
made  the  quick  heritage  of  the  multitude.  Here  religion  and 
reformation  were  not  the  possession  and  work  of  princes  and 
aristocrats,  but  of  the  masses.  Here,  first,  to  cite  a  few  out  of 
many  examples,  wei^e  practiced  wood  engraving,  and  the  cheap 
illustration  of  books,  the  weaving  of  linen  underclothing,  the 
reform  of  the  calendar,  and  the  abolition  of  witchcraft ;  here  were 
invented  the  pendulum  clock,  the  telescope,  spectacles,  and  a 
host  of  modern  comforts. 

Besides  this  growth  of  scores  of  little  municipal  republics, 
checking,  first,  feudalism  and  then  arbitrary  rule,  the  exceptional 
dissemination  of  books,  of  common-school  education,  and  of  the 
Bible  in  the  vernacular,  explain  largely  why,  in  the  sixteenth 
centur}',  a  strong  republic  sprang  up  in  Northern  Europe, 
federal,  Protestant,  tolerant,  and  free. 

,  Through  the  wonderful  activity  of  that  fraternity  of  teachers, 
begun  about  1360,  called  the  Brethren  of  the  Common  Life, 
the  Netherlands  had  the  first  system  of  common  schools  in 
Europe.  These  schools  flourished  in  every  large  town  and 
almost  in  every  village,  so  that  popular  education  was  the  rule. 
The  Netherlands,  as  soon  as  they  became  a  republic,  insured  their 
spiritual  independence  by  immediatclv  establishing  institutions 
of  education.  They  founded  universities  in  Leyden,  Franeker, 
Groningen,  Utrecht,  and  Harderwyck.  Soon  after  movable 
types  were  invented  Holland  became  the  printing  office  of 
Europe,  and  the  home  of  vernacular,  as  well  as  of  classic  learning. 
The  Bible  was  translated  as  early  as  1477,  the  same  year  in  whicli 
the  National  Parliament,  or  States-General,  first  assembled.  As 
soon  as  it  was  translated  it  was  printed  and  widely  circulated. 
Before  ever  there  was  a  Bible  printed  in  England,  the  common 


people  of  the  Netherlands  had  hought  and  read  twenty-four  edi- 
tions of  the  Dutch  New  Testament,  and  fifteen  editions  of  the  entire 
Bible.  The  Bible  was  thus  not  in  manuscript,  inaccessible  to 
poor  men,  or  furtively  copied  in  scraps  and  portions,  but  within 
the  reach  of  all.  There  was  no  other  nation  in  Europe  so  satu- 
rated with  Bible  ideas,  and  this  fact  explains  the  religious  history 
and  political  energy  of  the  Dutch.  The  Netherlands  furnished 
the  first  martyrs  of  the  Reformation,  as  well  as  the  greatest  num- 
ber. Esch  and  Voes  were  burnt  to  death  as  heretics,  July  i, 
1523,  fort)'^  years  before  the  first  under  Bloody  Mary  of  England, 
and  their  praises  were  sung  by  Luther. 

This  general  reading  of  the  Bibleby  the  quick-witted  and  serious 
people  who  had  conquered  the  sea,  and  won  the  mastery  over  nature 
in  art,  industry,  and  science,  made  them  also  hate  tyrants  and  love 
self-government.  True,  it  also  made  many  sects  besides  the  State 
Reformed  Church,  and  among  these  first  organized  in  power 
were  the  Anabaptists, — one  of  the  most  misrepresented  of  all 
bodies  of  men,  persecuted  by  Protestants  and  Catholics  alike, 
and  only  now  vindicated  by  modern  research.  Out  of  the  Ana- 
baptists sprang  the  Baptists  and  the  Qiiakers,  two  of  the  most 
democratic  denominations,  under  whom  two  of  our  freest  and 
noblest  American  States — Rhode  Island  and  Pennsylvania — were 
settled.  The  Anabaptists — that  is,  the  re-baptizers — were  all 
Congregationalists  in  church  polity.  Each  church  was  a  unit 
and  a  republic  by  itself,  their  only  officers  being  pastors  and  dea- 
cons ;  while  the  Mennonites,  who  originated  in  Holland,  were 
not  only  Congregational  in  polity,  but  the  foundation  principle 
was  what  is  now  the  cardinal  doctrine  of  American  political  life — 
the  utter  separation  of  church  and  state.  Persecuted  b}'  all  state 
churches,  their  children  found  toleration  in  Pennsylvania,  where 
they  produced,  in  their  "Book  of  Martyrs,"  the  largest  and  the 
finest  piece  of  printing  and  bookmaking  ever  done  in  the  Ameri- 
can colonies.  We  shall,  further  on,  try  to  show  that  not  only 
this  idea  of  the  separation  of  church  and  state,  but  nearly  all 
the  political  institutions  peculiarly  American,  came  out  of  Hol- 
land, and  not  out  of  England. 

In  brief,  in  the  sixteenth  century  the  common  people  of  the 
Netherlands,  owing  to  their  great  mechanical,  agricultural,  and 
nautical  skill,  their  intelligence  and  their  diversified  industries, 


were — what  we  like  to  say  of  Americans  to-day — the  best  fed, 
the  best  clothed,  the  best  educated,  and  the  most  relij^ious  people 
in  the  world.  The  Dutch  were  Calvinists,  and,  somehow,  Cal- 
vinism never  breeds  despotism  or  poverty.  IMotley,  in  telling 
their  story,  grandly  as  he  has  done  it,  has  practically  left  out 
the  mainspring  of  all — the  Dutchman's  intense  failh  in  God. 
Motley  is  too  much  of  a  partisan  not  only  for  the  Dutch  against 
the  Spaniard,  but  of  one  school  of  Dutch  writers.  Above  all, 
JSIotley  is  dramatic,  and  the  very  brilliancy  of  his  antitheses 
and  rhetoric  blinds  the  average  reader  to  the  moral  grandeur  of 
the  facts  he  arrays.  In  spite  of  Motley's  prodigious  industry  and 
superb  learning,  he  is  the  slave  of  one  author,  the  Dutch  histo- 
rian Wagenaar,  while  there  are  large  stores  of  evidence  and  au- 
thority into  which  he  never  looked.  Some  of  his  subjective  judg- 
ments, the  result  of  his  prejudices,  will  not  stand  as  the  verdict  of 
dispassionate  history. 

Contemporaneously,  England  presented  a  marked  contrast  with 
the  Netherlands.  She  had  a  population  of  but  two  and  a-half 
millions.  Only  one  fourth,  even,  of  her  arable  land  was  culti- 
vated, the  remainder  being  wild,  sterile,  or  fallow  land,  woods 
filled  with  wild  beasts,  or  a  great  stretch  of  marsh  and  fen,  which 
included  six  eastern  counties  of  England.  Only  one  kind  of 
farming  was  practiced,  the  grain  being  planted  one  year,  and  the 
field  allowed  to  lie  fallow  for  another.  The  root  crops  were  un- 
known, and  so  were  garden  vegetables.  Of  her  twenty-six  cities, 
London  and  Norwich  were  the  chief,  the  former  having  no  more 
than  100,000,  and  the  latter  about  5,000  people.  Her  onl}^  in- 
dustry for  centuries  had  been  wool-raising,  which  had  been  sent 
to  the  Netherlands  to  be  woven.  Her.  hemp,  flax,  and  hides 
were  exported  for  manufacture  by  the  Dutch.  The  people  were 
ignorant  and  poor.  Learning  was  confined  to  the  church  and 
the  court,  both  of  which  were  ordered  by  a  king  who  had  cast 
out  the  Pope,  and  made  himself  Defender  of  the  Faith.  Whereas 
in  Holland  the  confiscated  abbey  lands,  monasteries,  and  church 
funds  were  applied  to  common  schools,  universities,  and  hos- 
pitals, in  England  they  were  distributed  among  the  king's  favor- 
ites, the  nobles  and  the  State  church.  The  people  were  op- 
pressed by  land  laws  made  in  the  interest  of  the  nobles ;  for  feu- 
dalism in  England,  spite  of  Magna  Charta  and  so-called  Parlia- 


ments,  was  deeply  rooted  in  English  soil,  and  the  manor  system 
made  the  farmer  a  sort  of  serf.  The  old  common  lands  were  rap- 
idly going  the  way  they  have  since  about  all  gone — into  the  hands 
of  the  nobles.  The  food  of  the  common  people  was  chiefly  pork 
and  grain,  for  table  vegetables  were  unknown,  and  leprosy  and 
scurvy  were  common.  Their  clothes  were  of  coarse  homespun 
woolen,  or  linsey-woolsey,  for  the  finer  sorts  of  woolen  cloths 
came  entirely  from  the  Netherlands,  and  even  the  first  rough 
woolen  cloth  was  not  woven  in  England  luitil  Netherlands  weavers 
were  imported,  in  1331.  Such  luxuries  as  brick  houses,  under- 
clothing, or  table  linen  were  known  only  to  the  rich,  though  com- 
mon enough  across  the  Channel.  Indeed,  the  ordinary  English  name 
for  table  and  body  linen  was  "  Holland"  ;  while  the  very  names 
Lisle  thread.  Diaper,  Duffels,  Bombazine,  and  a  score  more  of 
textiles,  being  names  of  places  across  the  Channel,  show  their  origin. 
In  England  the  Bible  was  not  popularly  known  or  read. 
Wyclif  had,  indeed,  translated  the  Scriptures  out  of  the  Vulgate 
Latin  into  English  ;  but,  being  in  manuscript,  were  never  printed 
until  hundreds  of  years  afterwards,  and  then  only  as  a  literary 
curiosity  for  scholars.  Wyclif 's  translation  from  the  Vulgate  was 
practically  unknown  to  the  people  in  their  homes,  for  poor  men 
could  not  aflbrd  to  buy  a  manuscript  book  at  the  cost  of  a  year's 
wages.  Indeed,  in  the  strict  modern  sense  of  the  word,  which 
suggests  printing  and  diffusion,  Wyclif's  Bible  was  not  even  pub- 
lished. '  Further,  even  in  manuscript  it  was  prohibited  by  law,  in 
140S.  Indeed,  Wyclif  himself  did  not  become  a  pronounced 
opponent  of  the  Pope  until  he  had  visited  the  Netherlands,  under 
direction  of  John  of  Gaunt  who  re-introduced  still  large  numbers 
of  Dutch  weavers  into  Eastern  England,  where  for  centuries 
the  word  "weaver"  and  "heretic"  were  synonymous.  Even  the 
Lollards,  who  took  their  name  from  a  society  in  Antwerp,  were 
largely  found  in  those  eastern  counties  in  which  the  Flemish 
and  Dutch  farmers,  dike-builders,  brick-makers,  reclaimers  of 
land,  and  weavers  were  most  numerous  ;  so  that  even  in  the  first 
flush  of  tlie  coming  Protestantism  in  Wyclif's  time,  we  find  the 
Netherlands'  influence  discernible.  When,  however,  the  king, 
and  nobles,  and  state  churchmen  had  cast  on  it  the  odium  of  Wat 
Tvler's  rebellion,  aiul  crushed  out  the  Lollards  by  persecution, 
Wyclif's    Bible    became    a  curiosity,  and    the    promised    reform 


movement  a  memory.  When  finally  the  Protestant  Reformation, 
which  is  ours,  and  the  printed  Bible — the  h^nglish  Bible  that  we 
know — came  into  England,  it  was  through  Erasmus  the  Dutch- 
man, Luther  the  German,  and  Calvin  the  Frenchman  ;  while  the 
Bible  that  got  into  the  hands  of  the  people  was  not  from  the 
Latin  or  based  on  Wyclif,  but  made  direct  from  the  Hebrew  and 
Greek  by  Tyndale,  who  was  tracked  by  the  English  bloodhounds 
and  garroted.  The  editions  of  Tyndale's  New  Testament  smug- 
gled into  England,  were  printed  by  Dutchmen  on  Dutch  soil. 
When,  finally,  a  printing  press  was  set  up  and  the  Bible  printed  in 
England,  research  shows  that  the  foreman,  compositors,  and 
pressmen,  just  as  in  the  case  of  Caxton's,  a  generation  or  two  be- 
fore, were  Dutchmen.  It  must  not  be  forgotten,  either,  that  the 
grand  outburst  of  the  English  intellect  in  the  Elizabethan  era  was 
the  fruit  of  culture  on  pagan  lines,  even  as  the  government  of 
this  time  was  essentially  despotic.  It  was  part  of  the  Renais- 
sance, not  of  the  Reformation  which  was  built  on  the  open 
Bible.  For  wherev.er  the  Protestant  Reformation  was  a  move- 
ment of  the  people,  there  was  no  episcopacy,  but  the  Reformed 
church,  or  Presb\terian  government.  Wherever  the  Reformation 
was  the  work  of  kings  or  princes,  the  form  chosen  was  episcopacy, 
or  Lutheranism.  In  science,  too,  England  was  far  behind  the 
rest  of  Christendom ;  for  even  Bacon,  with  all  his  overrated 
learning,  was  the  victim  of  many  superstitions,  including  witch- 
craft, and  the  idea  that  the  sun  went  round  the  world.  Even 
down  to  1753  England  was  in  her  calendar,  like  Russia  to-day, 
eleven  days  behind  the  rest  of  the  civilized  world. 

In  political  and  religious  freedom  the  status  of  the  English 
was  far  before  that  of  the  people  of  the  Netherlands.  Magna 
Charta,  in  which  after  ages  have  seen  so  much,  was  an  episode  of 
feudalism.  Its  obtaining  was  not  the  work  of  the  common  peo- 
ple, but  it  was  demanded  by  a  confederacy  of  barons,  or  tenants- 
in-chief  of  the  crown.  In  the  event  of  Runny mede,  June  15, 
1 215,  a  company  of  feudal  proprietors  redressed  their  grievances 
of  feudal  tenure  against  the  royal  prerogative.  Indirectly, 
indeed.  Magna  Charta  made  for  the  good  of  the  people,  and  set 
the  supremacy  of  the  law  of  England  over  against  the  will  of  the 
monarch  ;  hence  it  was  in  after  ages  grandly  used  as  a  precedent 
of  liberty.     With  the  ]\Iagna  Charta,  whose  chief  glory  was  won 


8 

in  after  centuries,  grew  up  the  English  Parliament,  which  had, 
however,  in  the  days  of  Henry  VIII.,  become  as  to  power  a 
memory, — a  matter  of  archiEology,  rather  than  living  force.  The 
Parliament  that  to-day  rules  England  was  born  later,  in  the  strug- 
gles of  the  Puritans  with  the  Stuart  kings,  Charles  and  James. 

It  was  for  their  Bible  printing  and  reading,  their  sturdy 
Protestantism,  and  their  doctrine,  that  power  comes  from  the 
people,  and  their  insistance  upon  "no  taxation  without  consent  of 
the  taxpayer,"  that  Philip  II.  of  Spain  began,  in  1561,  the 
Inquisition.  It  was  for  these  that,  in  1567,  he  sent  the  bloody 
Duke  of  Alva  with  the  finest  infantry  in  Europe,  and  the  first 
army  equipped  with  muskets,  to  begin  those  persecutions  that 
made  the  martyr  roll  of  the  Netherlands  crimson  with  one  hun- 
dred thousand  names.  For  years  the  iron  heel  of  Spain  seemed 
planted  on  the  neck  of  the  little  country.  Then,  by  the  tens 
of  thousands,  the  Netherlanders  fled  to  lands  adjacent.  This 
tremendous  exodus  did  not  stop  until  the  seven  northern  prov- 
inces, led  by  brave  little  Holland,  formed  the  first  United  States 
in  a  federal  republic  ;  and  drawing  sword  against  the  Pope  and 
the  Spaniard,  threw  away  the  scabbard,  and  gave  the  world  the 
first  great  example  of  successful  revolt  against  tvranny.  It  is  suc- 
cessful precedents  that  rule  the  world. 

Where  did  these  Bible-reading  Protestants,  skilled  mechanics, 
farmers,  engineers,  inventors,  polished  gentlemen,  and  learned 
men  settle.'*  Many  in  Germany;  many  lived  at  Embden,  where 
flocked  the  English  refugees  driven  out  by  Bloody  Mary,  and 
where  election  by  the  written  ballot  was  the  rule  ;  but  most  of 
them  in  England.  In  open  boats,  braving  th'e  dangers  of  the 
stormy  North  Sea  and  English  Channel,  they  fled  to  hospitable 
England  that  had  then  no  mechanical  industries  worth  speaking 
of,  and  that  wanted  them.  They  swarmed  into  the  southern,  but 
more  numerously  in  those  eastern  counties  already  mightily 
leavened  by  previous  emigrations  of  Dutch  and  Flemish  weavers, 
brick-makers,  dike-builders,  and  reclauners  of  the  fens.  In  a 
word,  they  planted  themselves  in  those  very  counties  which  later 
became  the  hotbed  of  nonconformity,  the  hearth  of  the  new 
faith,  the  ash  heap  of  the  Protestant  martyr  fires,  the  cradle  of 
Congregationalism,  the  recruiting  ground  of  Cromwell's  Iron- 
sides and  army,  and  the  home  of  probably  three  fifths  of  the 
settlers  of  New  England. 


9 

It  is  true  that  of  this  great  immigration,  numbering  perhaps 
one  hunched  tliousand,  besides  Flemish  and  Dutch,  tliere  were 
thousands  of  Walloons  and  Huguenots.  There  were  many, 
also,  who  came  mainly  for  trade  and  gain,  but  the  vast  majority 
were  refugees  for  conscience'  sake,  as  truly  as  were  later  the 
Pilgrims  to  Holland.  This,  also,  is  certain,  that  among  them 
were  thousands  of  Anabaptists,  whose  polity  of  church  govern- 
ment was  purely  Congregational.  Coming  from  Embden  and 
Friesland,  of  which  we  know  the  features  of  local  government 
so  well  from  Ubbo  Emmius,  and  where,  especially  in  the  choosing 
of  church  officers,  the  method  was  by  the  written  ballot,  these 
despised  and  persecuted  people  brought  with  them  some  of  the 
practices  and  principles  we  now  A\alue  as  though  they  were 
entirely  of  New  England  and  American  origin. 

In  detail,  it  may  be  said,  these  Protestant  refugees  settled  in 
London,  Canterbury,  Colchester,  Maidstone,  Sandwich,  Dover, 
Hastings,  Rye,  Winchelsea,  Romney,  Hythes,  Sheffield,  Yar- 
mouth, Hattield,  and  a  score  of  smaller  towns.  More  numerously 
than  anywhere  else,  they  established  themselves  in  Suffiilk  and 
Norfolk  and  the  counties  adjacent.  The  region  around  Old  Bos- 
ton, in  Lincolnshire,  "the  capital  of  the  fens,"  which  were 
drained  by  the  Dutch,  is  still  called  "  Holland."  Burns,  in  his 
"  History  of  the  Protestant  Refugees  in  England,"  mentions  fourteen 
towns — all  of  them  reproduced  in  New  England — where  the 
Dutchmen  were  numerous.  They  drained  the  fens,  built  dikes, 
reclaimed  land  and  settled  on  it,  taught  and  practiced  hydraulic 
engineering,  scientific  farming,  introduced  gai'den  vegetables,  and 
taught  the  curing  of  herring.  We  find  them  introducing  window 
glass  in  the  dwelling  houses,  and  stained  glass  windows  in  the 
chapels  and  cathedrals  ;  the  making  of  iron  and  steel  at  Sheffield  ; 
the  manufacture  of  felt  and  beaver  hats  ;  and  the  invention  or 
improvement  of  pottery  and  porcelain  from  native  English  clay. 
But  more  than  all  else,  the  weavers  brought  or  made  their  looms, 
and  thus  introduced  the  arts  of  dyeing,  coloring,  and  various  textile 
industries.  They  made  lace  from  Antwerp  thread  at  Honiton, 
and  established  factories  in  other  lace  towns  in  various  shires. 
They  invented  new  styles  and  sorts  of  textures,  and  at  once  a  new 
vocabulary  of  dress-stufls  appeared  in  English  speech,  out  of 
which,  from  names  curiously  changed,  or  mispronounced,  we 
can  almost  construct  a  map  of  the  countries  adjoining  England. 


10 

To  give  some  idea  of  this  influx  of  skilled  labor  into  England, — 
remembering  that  the  figures  possible  to  attain  by  enumerating 
only  the  town  populations  are  necessarily  far  below  the  scattered 
total,  and  that  the  smaller  groups  are  left  out, — we  note  that  there 
were  (not  of  the  old  immigi'ation  of  two  centuries  before,  but 
fresh  Protestant  refugees)  in  1553,  15,000,  and  in  1562,  30,000 
Netherlanders  in  England.  In  156S,  of  6,704  foreigners  in  London 
(which  then  had  a  population  of  less  than  100,000),  5,235  were 
from  the  Netherlands.  In  Canterbury  two  thirds  of  the  population 
were  from  the  same  country.  In  Norwich,  in  157I5  there  were 
3,935  Dutch  and  Walloons,  and  in  15S7  there  were  4,679.  "Before 
the  end  of  Alva's  rule,"  says  Davies,  "there  had  quitted  the  Nether- 
lands 100,000  heads  of  families."  Of  this  number,  with  their 
households,  between  So, coo  and  100,000  persons  came  into  Eng- 
land. The  direct  influence  of  these  refugees  on  the  English  people 
was  seen  in  this — that  each  foreign  workman  was  compelled  by  law 
to  take  and  train  one  English  apprentice.  This  law  sent,  proba- 
bly, fifty  thousand  English  boys  and  young  men  to  school,  not 
only  in  industry,  but  in  republican  ideas  and  libei'al  notions. 

These  refugees,  as  English  historians  acknowledge,  achieved 
the  industrial  revolution  of  England.  They  laid  the  foundation 
of  that  commercial  and  manufacturing  supremacy  of  Great  Britain 
which  is  to-day  the  envy  and  w'onder  of  the  world,  and  which  has 
changed  the  character  of  the  islanders  from  that  of  shepherds  and 
agriculturists  to  that  of  machinists  and  manufacturers,  and  which 
has  made  England  the  richest  country  in  Europe.  The  fens  of 
Eastern  England  became  a  garden.  The  introduction  of  table 
vegetables  and  the  cultivation  of  winter  roots,  enabled  an  acre  of 
land  to  support  double  the  number  of  human  beings  living  ofl  it. 
One  direct  result  of  this,  as  Prof.  Thorold  Rogers  proves,  was 
that  the  population  of  England  was  quickly  doubled.  The  Dutch 
discovered  the  uses  of  clover,  and  introduced  the  so-called 
"  artificial  grasses,"  making  the  life  of  the  English  farm  laborer 
richer,  amazingly  improving  the  breeds  of  sheep  and  cattle,  and 
increasing  mightily  the  comfort  of  human  life.  The  plough  in 
its  modern  form  is  a  Dutch  invention  ;  so  are  the  uses  of  turnips, 
potatoes,  and  the  root  crops  by  which,  instead  of  the  old  custom 
of  letting  land  lie  fallow  a  whole  year,  tlie  same  meadow  can  be 
twice  cropped  in  one  year.     By  copying  the  horticultural,  agri- 


11 

cultural,  and  stock-raising  methods  of  the  land  which  boasts  a 
cow  to  every  human  inhabitant,  the  population  of  England  was 
not  only  doubled,  but  scurvy  and  leprosy  were  banished. 

Why  is  it  that  most  of  the^ names  of  things  in  and  on  a  ship,  in 
the  kitchen  and  dining  room,  of  garden  vegetables,  of  clothing,  of 
commerce  and  organized  industry,  are  in  so  many  cases  Dutch, 
and  were  more  numerously  so  in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth 
centuries?  Simply  because  they  were  direct  importations  from 
Holland.  Besides  these  comforts  of  life,  there  was  no  fine  art  of 
pamting  in  England  or  Scotland  until  Holbein  and  Van  Dyck 
brought  it  there.  The  Dutch  invented  oil  painting,  and  "the 
first  smile  of  the  republic  was  art."  So  far  as  we  have  oil  paint- 
ings of  New  England  worthies,  tliey  are  from  Dutch  easels.  In 
science  and  invention,  what  would  be  left  of  "Whewell's  History 
of  the  Inductive  Sciences"  after  all  references  to  the  Netherlands 
are  taken  out.^  London  is  now  the  financial  center  of  the  world, 
having  snatched  the  scepter  from  Amsterdam  ;  but  originally  the 
Bank  of  England  was  founded  by  men  whose  names  seem  taken 
from  a  Dutch  directory. 

In  theology,  queen  of  sciences,  what  does  not  England  owe 
Holland  from  Thomas  aKempis,  author  of  the  "Imitation  of  Christ," 
to  Kuenen,  one  of  the  ablest  intellects  of  Europe.''  Erasmus,  the 
great  humanist,  the  literary  king  of  Christendom,  was  at  Oxford 
as  early  as  1498,  and  at  the  zenith  of  his  fame  spent  five  years  mostly 
at  Cambridge.  It  was  he  who  introduced  the  study  of  Greek 
in  England,  and  first  taught  the  peerless  language  in  an  English 
university.  How  mighty  his  influence  was,  is  seen  even  to-day, 
for  his  scepter  touches  us  yet.  In  America,  and  Great  Britain,  and 
all  the  English  colonies,  with  very  slight  changes,  Greek  is  pro- 
nounced as  if  it  were  common  Dutch.  It  was  the  Dutch  Erasmus 
that  gave  to  the  world  that  edition  of  the  Greek  New  Testament 
which  all  the  reformers  of  every  country  studied  ;  which  more 
than  any  other  one  thing — humanly  speaking — produced  the 
Protestant  Reformation.  For  over  three  hundred  years  tliis 
Dutchman's  edition  of  the  Greek  Testament  has  been  the  re- 
ceived text  of  the  original  of  our  English  New  Testament,  as 
well  as  of  Luther's  German.  It  was  this  Dutchman  who  trans- 
lated it  into  pure  and  elegant  Latin  which  first  departed  widely 
from  the  Vulgate,  and  thus  became  the  chief  corner  stone  of  the 


12 

Reformation.  After  all  criticisms  are  made  on  Erasmus,  it  is 
hard  to  see  how  there  could  have  been  any  Protestant  Reforma- 
tion without  the  work  he  did.  Erasmus  was  one  of  the  direct 
fruits  of  the  great  school  system  of  the  Brethren  of  the  Common 
Life  in  Holland. 

Systematic  theology  as  the  Pilgrims  and  early  Puritans  knew 
it,  apart  from  Calvin,  was  made  in  Holland,  and  perfected  at  that 
only  ecumenical  Protestant  council,  held  at  Dordrecht,  in  1619, 
whicli  Robinson  attended,  and  at  which  Dr.  Ames,  so  persecuted 
by  the  English  hierarchy  and  denounced  by  King  James,  was  re- 
ceived, honored,  and  employed  by  the  Dutch,  in  spite  of  King 
James  and  all  his  bishops.  One  of  tlie  strong  ties  binding  the 
Dutch  and  the  Pilgrims  together  in  congenial  friendship,  was  their 
common  adherence  to  the  identical  system  of  theology. 

Still  further,  we  must  look  to  Holland  for  the  orgin  and 
growtli  of  that  Biblical  theology  which  is  now  everywhere  sup- 
planting systematic.  Coccejus,  the  Leyden  professor,  is  its 
acknowledged  father.  He  founded  his  theology  on  the  Bible 
alone,  without  consulting  Augustine,  Calvin,  or  any  but  inspired 
men.  Many  of  the  framers  of  the  Westminster  Confession  and 
Catechism,  and  of  the  leading  Congregational  ministers  of  Eng- 
land, received  their  education  at  Leyden  or  Utrecht  during  the 
seventeenth  century,  then  the  finest  universities  in  Europe,  one 
of  them  educating  two  thousand  English  students. 

Why  are  Cambridge  and  Oxford  so  different — the  one  so  pro- 
gressive, the  other  so  reactionary  ?  Is  it  any  wonder  that  Cam- 
bridge, which  is  right  in  the  heart  of  these  eastern  counties  of 
England,  which  in  the  fourteenth  century  were  thickly  planted 
with  the  Dutch  weaver-heretics,  and  in  the  sixteenth  century 
were  overrun  by  the  republican  and  Bible-reading  Protestants 
of  tlie  Netherlands,  which  was  almost  reborn  under  Erasmus 
and  John  A'Lasco,  his  pupil,  which  was  served  by  the  great 
Dutch  professor  of  history,  Dorislaus  should  have  begun  to 
be,  and  should  still  continue  to  be,  the  center  of  liberal  ideas.'' 
Oxford,  in  the  midland  counties,  has  always  been  royal,  conserv- 
ative, and  reactionary  ;  while  Cambridge  has  been  parliamentary, 
lil:)cral,  and  progressive.  Among  her  sons  in  the  sixteenth  and 
seventeenth  centuries  were  Tyndale,  and  the  leading  Nonconformists 
and  Independents  besides  the  Congregationahsts,  Robert  Browne 


13 

ami  John  Robinson.  Oxford  educated  champions  of  episcopacy, 
and  the  ecclesiastics  of  the  Established  Church.  Cambridge,  right 
in  the  heart  of  the  Netherlands  influence,  trained  the  Pilgrims, 
Puritans,  and  Liberals.  Of  seventeen  most  prominent  New 
England  clergymen  in  the  New  England  colonies,  fourteen  were 
trained  at  Cambridge,  and  of  eighty  known  names  the  majority 
received  education  at  the  same  place. 

The  mention  of  the  names  of  Browne  and  Robinson  stirs  the 
heart  of  every  Congregationalist.  The  question  is  at  once  asked, 
to  the  answer  of  which  noble  scholars  have  devoted  years  of  re- 
search. Where  lay  the  fountain  of  the  sacred  fire.-*  Did  it  first 
burn  in  their  own  hearts  out  of  the  Word,  or  were  there  other 
Bible  students  who  before  Browne  had  churches  Congregational 
in  polity,  and  free  from  the  State.'' 

It  has  been  said,  by  those  who  think  that  the  mere  suggestion 
that  we,  either  as  New  Englanders  or  Congregationalists,  owe 
anything  to  the  Dutch,  is  "a  fancy  in  the  face  of  history," 
"a  pleasing  fiction,"  something  to  be  scoffed  at,  that  it  is  all 
the  more  suspicious,  that  it  has  taken  two  hundred  and  seventy 
years  to  find  out  such  obligation.  Possibly  so  ;  but  then,  as 
matter  of  fact,  it  took  two  hundred  and  thirty-nine  years  to  find 
even  the  place  whence  the  Pilgrims  came.  From  Scrooby,  and 
Bawtry,  and  Austerfield,  even  the  very  fact  of  the  Pilgrims' 
emigration,  or  of  their  ever  having  lived  there,  had  faded  out. 
No  tradition  survived,  or  was  locally  known,  until  reverent 
American  research  on  the  spot  informed  the  people,  and  repro- 
duced the  past.  Even  in  England,  within  fifty  years,  when  a 
picture  of  the  departure  of  the  Pilgrims  in  the  Speedwell  from 
Delfshaven  was  hung  up  in  the  corridor  of  the  House  of  Lords, 
it  was  labeled,  "  Departure  of  a  Puritan  Family  for  New  Eng- 
land," even  though  the  painter  declared  he  had  taken  his  ideas 
from  Governor  Bradford's  own  writings.  Only  after  repeated 
protest  to  Lord  Macaulay  and  Earl  Stanhope,  were  the  words 
"  Pilgrim  Fathers  "  substituted  for  "  Puritan  Family."  Even  now 
in  the  painting  on  the  wall  of  the  Lords'  corridor  on  the  ship 
sailing  from  Delfshaven,  is  the  word  "Mayflower,"  instead  of 
"Speedwell."  It  is  only  within  very  recent  years  that  the  popu- 
lar confusion,  even  in  American  minds,  of  the  term  Puritan  and 
Pilgrim  has  been  partly  clarified  ;   and  it  is  yet  on  Forefathers' 


14 

Day  a  frequent  phenomenon  when  orators,  supposed  to  be 
scholars,  seem  hopelessly  mixed,  and  become  amusingly  hazy,  on 
the  subject.  Some  things  which  we  know  about  the  Bible,  about 
history,  about  truth,  do  not  get  discovered  imtil  after  thousands 
of  years.  Do  not  critics  of  Congregationalism  say  it  is  a  modern 
invention  ?  We  who  read  the  New  Testament  know  better ; 
but  then,  it  is  a  fact  that  Congregationalism  was  practically 
rediscovered  when  the  Greek  language  rose  from  the  dead  with 
the  New  Testament  in  her  hands.  Who  first  rediscovered  it, 
the  Dutch  Anabaptists  or  the  Protestant  English  ? 

Only  recently  have  English  historians  begun,  in  writing  the 
history  of  England,  to  look  beyond  the  sea,  and  to  link  insular  to 
continental  history.  The  history  of  the  United  States  has  not 
yet  been  written  except  by  New  England  historians,  who  have  a 
tendency  to  forget,  or  do  not  like  to  know,  what  New  York,  Penn- 
sylvania, and  Virginia  have  done.  Even  yet,  in  the  eyes  of  Eng- 
lish historians,  republics  are  not  quite  respectable.  English  his- 
torians draw  roots,  precedents,  comparisons,  from  monarchies, — 
Germany,  France,  Italy,  Spain  ;  but  i^epublican  Switzerland  and 
Holland  they  scarcely  notice.  So  our  historians  copy  English 
models,  and  think  that  in  our  political  development  we  are  Eng- 
lish, and  the  fruits  of  English  life  alone,  instead  of  the  movement 
of  continental  Evu-ope.  They  say  we  are  an  English  nation,  and 
they  attempt  to  derive  our  institutions  from  England,  notwith- 
standing that  our  institutions  which  are  most  truly  American 
were  never  in  England.  The  story  of  Holland's  direct  influence 
on  the  English-speaking  world  is  an  omitted  chapter. 

Where  is  the  historian  of  England,  or  of  the  United  States,  or 
of  New  England,  or  of  Congregationalism,  who  shows  critical 
acquaintance  with  the  details  of  Dutch  history?  Do  not  most 
New  England  writers  take  what  Washington  Irving  himself 
confessed  was  his  own  coarse  caricature  of  the  early  history  of 
New  York  as  actual  fact,  and  rely  upon  Diedrich  Knickerbocker 
for  "local  color".''  What  American  college  has  in  its  library 
a  set  of  the  works  of  Dutch  historians.''  Rarely  is  an  American 
professor  of  history  at  home  in  the  language  and  literature  of  the 
one  republic  vsdiich  was  the  training  school  of  our  nation's  found- 
ers and  the  "great  example"  of  our  revolutionary  and  constitu- 
tional fathers. 


15 

The  story  of  the  Dutch  influence  upon  the  English^Uommon- 
wealth  cannot  be  traced  in  those  Acts  of  Parliament,  archives 
chronicles,  and  state  papers  which  make  the  usual  staple  of  the 
historian.  This  jiowerful  influence  was  not  phenomenal ;  it  came 
without  observation,  with  no  noise  of  trumpets,  but  rather  like 
the  dew,  or  sunshine,  or  other  things  less  noticed  than  a  meteor 
or  a  thunderstorm.  It  may  be  likened  in  lesser  degree  to  that 
Christianity  of  whose  history  in  the  second  century  we  know  so 
little,  which  yet  transformed  the  Roman  Empire.  A  knowledge 
of  the  facts  in  the  sixteenth  century  once  obtained,  is  like  an 
electric  search  light  all  along  the  track  of  English  and  American 
history. 

Brethren,  it  may  be  that  we  Congregationlists  owe  something 
even  more  directly  to  the  Dutch  ;  that  we  inheritors  of  the  New 
Testament  polity  are  debtors  to  the  Barbarians  as  well  as  to  the 
Greeks,  to  the  Dutch  as  well  as  to  Browne  and  Robinson. 

To  my  mind  it  is  more  than  probable  that  our  American 
Congregationalism  was  borrowed,  in  germ,  at  least,  from  these 
Dutch  refugees  in  England.  We  do  not  assert,  or  positively 
claim,  that  Robert  Browne  got  his  ideas  of  Congregationalism 
from  these  Dutchmen,  but  this  is  what  the  facts  show  ;  viz.,  that 
all  through  SutTolk  and  Norfolk,  and  especially  right  in  Nor- 
wich, where  Biowne  lived  and  taught,  were  Dutch  Anabaptists, 
whose  government  was  Congregational  in  form.  Each  congre- 
gation of  the  Dutch  Anabaptists  and  Mennonites  was  a  distinct 
church,  a  republic  by  itself,  holding,  besides  many  things  we  do 
not  hold,  substantially  to  the  same  order  as  that  of  the  Baptists 
and  Congregational ists  of  to-day.  They  had  so  held  these  prin* 
ciples  before  Browne  was  born.  Living  in  England,  where  the 
Established  church  was  all-powerful,  they  paid  their  taxes,  fur- 
nished substitutes  for  military  service,  but  kept  intact  their  ideas 
of  religious  freedom. 

Right  where  the  fire  was  already  kindled  in  England,  tliere 
was  our  flame  lighted  and  thence  the  torch  borne.  Remember, 
that  in  Bloody  Mary's  reign,  from  1563  to  1567,  of  two  hundred 
and  eighty  martyrs,  the  burnings  were  in  general  most  numerous  in 
the  towns  overrun  by  the  continental  refugees  ;  such  as  Maidstone, 
which  furnished  seven,  and  Canterbury  forty,  and  Lewes  seven- 
teen, while  seventy,  or  one  fourth  of  the  whole  number  burnt, 


16 

came  from  the  woolen  and  weaving  districts  of  the  eastern 
counties.  Beyond  the  parts  overrun  by  the  Dutchmen,  this  New 
Testament  "■heresy,"  or  martyrdom  because  of  it,  was  rare. 
When,  later,  Robert  Browne  lived  and  preached  in  Norwich,  the 
Dutch  and  Walloons  then  numbered  one  half  of  the  population, 
and  the  Anabaptists  were  having  their  ears  cropped,  their  noses 
sliced,  or  were  burnt  alive  in  the  castle  ditch  right  under  Browne's 
windows,  while  he  daily  lived  right  among  them.  So,  also, 
John  Robinson,  who  held  a  charge  in  or  very  near  Norwich,  had 
hundreds  of  these  Congregational  Anabaptists  all  around  him. 
Certain  it  is  that  in  the  eastern  counties  of  England,  and  right  out 
of  the  midst  of  the  Netherlands  influence,  English  Congrega- 
tionalism arose,  and  here  English  Congregationalists  multiplied. 

Another  point  to  be  noticed  about  the  rise  of  Congregational- 
ism, as  well  as  of  nonconformity  generally,  is,  that  the  vast  ma- 
jority of  these  New  Testament  heretics  wei'e  poor  men  of  the 
humbler  classes.  Not  only  do  the  historians  Strype,  Hollings- 
head,  Hopkins,  and  others  tell  us  this,  but  the  bishops,  their 
critics  and  enemies,  expatiate  on  the  fact  that  these  heretics  are 
cobblers,  weavei's,  feltmakers,  dyers,  and  other  mechanics  and 
wage  earners,  or,  as  they  said,  '•'such  trash," — in  other  words,  the 
very  men  most  closely  associated  with  the  Dutch  Anabaptist  me- 
chanics and  workingmen  who  overran  the  eastern  counties.  In 
those  days  there  was  no  need  of  the  discussion  about  "the  church 
and  the  workingman."     The  workingmen  made  the  church. 

Let  us  look  further,  and  note  that  a  noticeable  strain  of  Eng- 
lish blood  flows  from  this  immigration.  Thousands  of  these 
Dutchmen  and  other  refugees,  from  the  fourteenth  to  the  seven- 
feenth  centuries,  changed  the  pronunciation  and  spelling  of  their 
names,  translated  them  into  English,  or  otherwise  x\nglicized 
them  beyond  all  recognition,  and  were  merged  into  the  great 
ethnic  composite  of  the  English  people.  Thousands  of  their 
children,  also,  married  and  remained  in  England.  The  preva- 
lence of  certain  family  names  in  these  eastern  counties  is  to-day, 
even  were  there  no  other  testimony,  strong  evidence  of  a  power- 
ful Netherlandish  infusion.  It  has  been  remarked  by  the  great 
authority  in  genealogy,  Mr.  Savage,  that  over  eighty  per  cent  of 
the  original  settlers  of  New  England  could  trace  their  descent  to 
the  eastern  counties  of  England.     He    might    have    added,  that 


17 

going  farther  back  in  time  they  could  trace  them,  in  a  consider- 
able number  of  cases,  to  Dutch  immigrant  ancestors. 

When  one  of  several  of  the  companies  of  English  Brownists, 
or  Congregationalists,  at  Gainsborough  and  Scrooby,  called  to 
face  persecution,  imprisonment,  and  death,  sought  refuge  and 
asylum,  where  did  they  look?  Where  save  to  Holland,  in  which 
they  heard  there  was  "freedom  of  religion  for  all  men"?  How 
had  they  heard  it  ?  From  the  thousands  of  Hollanders  in  Eng- 
land, because  the  news  of  the  Dutch  declaration  of  independence 
of  Spain  and  the  story  of  Leyden,  of  the  toleration  afforded  even 
to  Jews  at  Amsterdam,  was  already  a  generation  old  ;  perhaps 
from  English  wits  and  politicians  who  sneered  at  the  vcr^'  idea 
of  toleration  ;  from  Bradford  himself,  who  had  been  in  the  Nether- 
lands when  a  youth.  So  they  fled  to  "the  States," — that  is,  the 
United  States  of  the  Netherlands.  At  Amsterdam,  "Brownists 
^Vlley"  is  still  so  named,  and  there  stands  yet  their  humble  meet- 
ing house.  The  Scrooby  company,  led  by  Robinson,  after  a 
year  in  Amsterdam  left  tlieir  quarrelsome  brethren,  and  found 
welcome,  honor,  peace,  and  comparative  comfort  in  eleven  years' 
residence  at  Leyden.  There  they  lived  during  the  truce  with 
Spain,  and  before  the  war  again  broke  out  the  best  part  of  them 
were  on  their  way  to  America. 

What  did  these  Pilgrims  learn  in  the  Dutch  Republic?  How 
were  they  treated  ?  How  were  they  trained  during  those  pregnant 
years  from  Scrooby  to  Cape  Cod,  when,  as  precious  oil  in  the 
hands  of  the  Almighty,  they  were  poured  from  vessel  to  vessel, 
until  beaten,  refined,  pure,  their  light  was  kindled  to  shine  on 
forever  ? 

We  do  not  know  all  that  we  should  like  to  know,  but  this  is 
certain  :  The  leaders  and  most  forceful  men  among  the  Pilgrim 
company,  as  the  municipal  records  in  the  townhall  of  Ley- 
den still  show,  became  citizens,  paid  their  taxes,  and  took 
advantage  of  the  common  schools  and  the  inunicipal  privileges. 
They  thus  received  practical,  political  education  in  a  republic. 
Many,  probably  nearly  all  the  original  Scrooby  company,  learned 
to  speak  and  read  Dutch  fluently.  Some  of  them  married  Dutch 
wives,  and  thus  a  noticeable  strain  of  Pilgrim  blood  is  Dutch 
blood.  Exercised  and  sensitive  on  all  questions  relating  to  soul 
and  body,  God  and  man,  searching  heaven  and  earth,  sacred  and 


18 

classic  history,  for  precedents  relating  to  the  ruler  and  ruled  in 
government,  they  learned  much.  Holland  was  then  the  foremost 
school  of  political  science,  so  far  as  government  was  exhibited  in 
a  republic.  In  this  country,  and  at  this  time,  and  right  before 
the  Pilgrims'  eyes,  men  were  trying  the  experiment  of  self-gov- 
ernment, and  to  make  a  nation  out  of  states  as  varied  in  elements 
as  Massachusetts  and  South  Carolina.  The  forces  of  Calhounism 
under  Barneveldt,  and  of  Lincolnism,  or  vmion  and  central  gov- 
ernment, under  Maurice,  were  contending  in  death  grapple. 
They  saw  the  people  and  the  Calvinists  vv'ere  always  with  the 
House  of  Orange,  who  stood  for  the  union  ;  while  Barneveldt 
and  the  Arminians  stood  for  state  rights  and  secession.  At  the 
same  time  the  Dutch  were  fighting  their  Gettysburg  in  home 
politics,  they  were  arming  for  another  twenty-eight  years'  fight 
for  life  against  the  Spaniard.  Grotius  was  writing  his  epoch-mak- 
ing book  on  international  law,  which,  more  than  any  other  unin- 
spired writing,  taught  national  righteousness  and  the  duties  of 
countries  one  to  another;  while  from  the  presses  of  Leyden  and 
other  Dutch  cities  were  issuing  books  that  described  and  analyzed, 
gave  the  history  and  philosophy,  both  local  and  national  methods 
of  government,  in  the  one  republic  of  Northern  Europe,  in  which 
at  that  time  were  living  most  of  the  political  and  military  leaders 
of  the  men  who  settled  Massachusetts,  Rhode  Island,  Connecticut, 
New  York,  and  Pennsylvania.  The  time  when  Englishmen 
were  numerousl}'  abroad,  and  in  a  republic,  too,  was  the  time  of 
Holland's  richest  fruitage  of  political  science.  Even  in  the  mat- 
ter of  loneliness,  the  Pilgrims  in  Leyden  were  lonely  only  as  they 
chose  to  be  loneh^  There  were  in  the  same  city  an  English 
church  a  few  yards  from  their  meeting  house,  and  one  hundred 
and  thirty-five  English  families  resident.  Englishmen — soldiers, 
travelers,  merchants,  ecclesiastics — were  all  around  them.  Prob- 
ably an  average  of  ten  thousand  British  subjects  dwelt  in  the 
Netherlands  during  their  stay.  They  lived  under  the  shadow  of 
the  greatest  university  of  Europe,  that  matriculated  over  two 
thousand  English  students  in  the  seventeenth  century,  of  which 
their  own  Robinson,  and  Brewer  were  members. 

What  they  learned  we  do  not  know  fully ;  but  these  high- 
souled  men,  wide-awake  to  all  good  influences,  lived  in  a  good 
school.       Surely   it   was   a    kind    Providence    that   kept    these 


19 

founders  of  New  England  eleven  years  in  a  federal  republic. 
Let  us  see  what  things,  what  institutions  like  those  in  this  repub- 
lic of  ours,  they  had  daily  before  their  eyes. 

1.  They  lived  under  a  national  religious  establishment,  which, 
though  a  State  Protestant  Church,  something  like  that  of  Eng- 
land, yet,  unlike  England's,  tolerated  other  faiths,  even  Roman 
Catholic  and  Jewish  when  exercised  in  private  houses  privately  ; 
and  to  all  Protestant  sects  and  congregations,  especially  the 
English,  furnished  places  of  worship  when  regular,  formal  appli- 
cation was  properly  made  therefor.  They  enjoyed,  also,  what 
Milton  later  plead  for, — the  liberty  of  unlicensed  printing.  They 
enjoyed  the  benefit  of  the  free  schools  for  their  children.  While 
the  English  political  church  emissaries  were  all  the  time  prodding 
the  Dutch  government  to  molest  them,  the  Dutch  government, 
often  defying  King  James,  quietly  sheltered  the  Pilgrims. 

2.  They  lived  in  a  land  where  they  could  buy,  hold,  and  sell 
land  in  fee  simple,  which  they  could  not  do  in  England,  with  its 
entail  and  primogeniture,  manor  system  and  semi-feudalism  ; 
and  they  lived  in  a  land  whei'e  deeds  and  mortgages  were  regis- 
tered. 

3.  They  lived  under  a  system  of  local  self-government  which 
had  its  town  meetings,  with  its  written  ballot  and  its  municipal 
representation  in  the  state  or  provincial  legislature.  In  every 
court  was  the  public  prosecuting  ofiicer,  named  the  '•'•  schout"  ox 
what  we  call  the  "district  attorney," — the  accused  having  the 
right  of  counsel  for  defense,  and  money  indemnity  paid  to  the 
acquitted  person  wrongly  accused.  Both  the  jurisprudence  and 
the  prison  system  of  Holland,  as  they  saw,  were  vastly  in  advance 
of  what  they  had  actually  experienced  in  England. 

4.  They  lived  under  a  republic  of  united  states  which,  with 
all  its  defects,  had  a  written  constitution,  the  Union  of  Utrecht,  or 
of  the  Seven  United  States  of  Holland,  framed  in  iS79?  ^"tl  foi' 
two  hundred  and  fifteen  years  appealed  to  as  the  supreme  law  of 
the  land  by  the  Supreme  Court  of  Holland.  In  that  republic, 
whose  motto  was,  "  In  vmion  there  is  strength,"  and  whose  flag 
was  the  red,  white,  and  blue,  the  stadtholder,  or  president,  ruled, 
his  powers  defined  by  the  written  compact,  so  that  he  could 
neither  expand  into  a  dictator  nor  dwindle  into  a  figurehead.  We 
grant  it  was  not,  nationally,  a  constitutional  democracy  like  ours, 


20 

but  a  confederation  of  sovereignties  ;  but,  in  its  municipal  life  all 
Holland  was  intensely  republican  ;  and  it  was  the  city  life  that  most 
affected  the  English  dwelling  in  the  country.  The  national  legis- 
lature, Congress,  or  States  General,  like  ours, — for  ours  is  copied 
directly  from  it, — consisted  of  two  houses;  one  the  Senate,  repre- 
senting sovereign  states,  and  having  the  treaty-making  power,  and 
the  other  a  popular  assembly  representing  the  people.  The  free- 
dom of  the  press  was  guai-anteed,  and  limited  only  as  ours  is 
limited.  The  Pilgrim  printers  published  freely,  but  the  line  was,  in 
1619,  drawn  at  scurrilous  and  slanderous  books,  and  until  they  were 
suspected  of  printing  those  they  were  absolutely  unmolested. 
Complete  independence  of  the  judiciary  was  the  rule.  In  a  word, 
that  which  we  countmost  peculiarly  American,  existed  in  the  heroic 
days  of  the  Dutch  Republic,  before  the  eyes  of  the  founders  of 
Massachusetts.  A  detailed  examination  shows  that  our  American 
political  institutions,  when  compared  with  those  of  the  other 
nations  of  Europe, — classic,  media3vat,  or  modern, — are  more  like 
those  of  the  republic  of  the  Netherlands  than  like  any  other. 
We  do  not  deny  that  this  federal  republic  of  the  Netherlands, 
compared  to  ours,  was  a  crude  and  weak  affair  ;  that  even  its 
privileges  and  liberties,  when  set  by  the  side  of  those  with  us,  which 
have  been  won  after  three  hundred  years  experience  in  the  New 
Woi'ld,  seem  small ;  but  for  that  time  they  were  wonderful.  For, 
far  ahead  of  the  nations  in  toleration  and  freedom,  the  Dutch  were 
ridiculed  by  other  nations  as  being  eccentric,  as '  introducing 
dangerous  innovations  in  government ;  yet,  in  sjDite  of  contempt 
and  ridicule,  these  men  of  the  United  States  of  Holland  perse- 
vered, and  thus  gave  the  precedent  of  success  for  all  time,  and  the 
cue  to  the  English  Commonwealth  and  the  Revolution  of  16S8, 
and  to  the  American  Revolution.  Successful  jDrecedents  govern 
the  world. 

How  were  the  Pilgrims  treated  by  the  Dutch  individually, 
and  by  the  Government?  We  answer,  "The  hospitality  of  the 
free  republic  of  Holland  was  generously  bestowed.''  We  shall 
now  give  proofs  and  answer  criticisms. 

I.  The  Pilgrims  did  not  get  free  food,  clothing,  rent,  or  use 
of  a  church  edifice  when  it  was  not  asked  for.  They  were  not 
treated,  they  did  not  wish  to  be  treated,  as  paupers,  but  as  men, 
and  their  leader  as  a  scholar.     What  was  most  precious  to  them 


21 

they  received.  Theirs  was  in  full  what  England  denied  them, — 
life,  liberty,  freedom  to  worship  (iod  in  their  own  way,  and  the 
pursuit  of  happiness.  The  measure  of  freedom,  toleration,  and 
protection  granted  them  was  equal  to  that  which  the  Dutch  Gov- 
ernment bestowed  upon  their  own  people. 

But  some  have  said,  "  Not  so  ;  this  idea  of  Dutch  hospitality 
is  a  pleasing  fiction,"  "  a  fancy  that  is  in  the  face  of  history,"  and 
we  have  no  money  to  waste  on  a  monument  at  Delfshaven  or 
anywhere  else  to  perpetuate  such  a  fancy.  Special  criticisms  have 
been  made  upon  the  project  of  this  Boston  Congregational  Club 
to  erect  a  memorial  in  honor  alike  of  the  Pilgrims  and  their 
Dutch  hosts  at  Delfshaven,  where  the  dikes  were  cut  to  relieve 
Leyden,  and  whence  the  founders  of  New  England  sailed  to 
America. 

Most  of  the  criticisms  made  refer  to  the  acts  of  individual 
Hollanders ;  and  the  original  writings  of  Bradfor^J,  Winslow, 
and  other  Pilgrims  have  been  put,  by  the  critics,  under  the 
microscope  to  find  one  single  passage  that  could  be  made  to  seem 
like  complaint  of  the  Dutch,  and  harsh  treatment  by  them.  The 
search  has  been  made  in  vain.  The  Pilgrim  writers  dwell  much 
on  their  own  straitened  cotidition^  on  their  reasons  for  leaving 
Holland,  but  have  only  gratitude  and  kind  words  for  the  hospita- 
ble people  and  goodly  land  that  sheltered  them.  Let  us  consider 
these  criticisms  in  detail. 

I.  After  an  English  sea  captain  had  already  deceived  and 
betrayed  the  Scrooby  men,  they  engaged  at  Hull  a  Dutch  skipper 
to  meet  them  on  the  Lancashire  coast  and  carry  them  to  Amster- 
dam. True  to  his  word  he  appeared  punctually,  despite  the  risk 
he  ran  ;  for  both  the  Pilgrims  and  the  Dutchmen  were  breaking 
the  law  of  the  land  in  attempting  unlicensed  emigration  ;  /.  ^.,  to 
get  out  of  England  by  the  way  of  the  underground  railroad  to  the 
Canada  of  that  day.  After  part  of  the  men  had  got  on  board,  the 
armed  police  of  King  James  appeared  in  the  distance.  What 
should  the  Dutchman  do.''  In  any  event  he  must  lose  his  profits. 
Should  he  lose  his  ship,  too,  be  cast  into  prison  with  all  his  crew, 
and,  further,  surrender  up  those  Pilgrims  who  were  already  on 
board  to  prison,  and  possible  death  ?  Even  the  men  of  the  Pilgrim 
company  left  on  shore,  with  the  exception  of  a  few  who  stayed 
with  the  women,  ran  away  to  save  themselves.  Of  the  conduct 
of  the  Dutch  captain,  in  such  a  case,  judge  you. 


22 

2.  It  is  said  that  Robinson's  company  in  Leyden  "was  not 
allowed  to  have  a  meeting  house," 

Answer.  The  profound  researches  of  Dutch  scholars,  archi- 
vists, and  historians,  backed  by  the  labors  of  American  specialists 
and  men  of  research,  have  failed  to  find  any  trace  of  a  desire  on 
the  part  of  the  Pilgrims  to  have  a  meeting  house  at  the  gift  of  the 
govei'nment.  They  made  no  application  for  a  place  to  worship 
in.  We  know  that  other  Protestant  congregations,  asking, 
received.  Consistent  with  their  intensely  Separatist  and  Inde- 
pendent principles,  they  preferred  to  be  by  themselves,  pay  their 
own  rent,  and  ask  no  favors.  All  who  believed  in  Christ  could 
have  a  church,  or  house  of  worship,  if  regularly  applied  for  ;  but 
the  Pilgrims  would  not  recognize  a  State  church.  "  They  stood 
on  their  own  legs."  They  were  true  to  their  own  principles. 
Heartily  in  sympathy  with  the  Dutch  Calvinists  in  theology,  they 
differed  with  them  on  the  question  of  church  polity,  and  declined 
all  ecclesiastical  favors.  They  even  criticised  freely  certain 
Dutch  customs,  such  as  the  election  of  church  officers  in  rotation, 
instead  of  for  life,  which  their  descendants  have  since  almost 
universally  followed.  The  Dutch  churches  elected  elders  and 
deacons  for  a  term  of  years,  not  for  life  ;  the  American  Congre- 
gationalists  now  do  the  same.  In  making  answer  to  this  objec- 
tion, as  in  others,  the  defense'  of  the  Dutch  is  the  defense  of  the 
Pilgrims,  also,  for  the  Pilgrims  were  nobly  consistent. 

3.  It  is  said  that  while  Rev.  Robert  Durie,  pastor  of  the 
English  church  in  Leyden,  had  to  wait  onh-  a  year  before  being 
admitted  to  the  privileges  of  membership  in  the  University,  John 
Robinson  had  to  wait  five  years  and  a-half  for  the  like  privilege, 
— that  is,  free  tuition,  free  use  of  the  library,  large  personal  and 
municipal  privileges,  and  almost  unlimited  free  beer  and  wine,  in 
an  age  when  the  hot  drinks  of  modern  life,  tea,  cofiee,  and  choco- 
late, were  unknown. 

Answer.  No  one  except  the  omniscient  God  now  knows 
whether  Robinson  was  obliged  to  wait,  or  voluntarily  waited. 
When,  however,  it  is  remembered  that  Robinson  had  come  from 
the  quarrelsome  Brownists  of  Amsterdam,  and  lived  two  years  in 
Leyden  before  having  a  ])crmancnt  house  or  becoming  a  property 
owner,  there  may  have  l)een  good  reason  why  the  Leyden  Uni- 
versity   kept    Robinson    waiting — even    supposing    they    did,   of 


23 

which  there  is  no  proof.  Both  Robinson  and  Brewer  were  ad- 
mitted to  the  Leyden  University,  and  reaped  great  benefits  from 
tlieir  privileges.  The  number  of  members  or  fellows  of  the 
University  was  necessarily  limited,  for  with  membership  went 
other  valuable  accessories  which  illustrate  old-time  Dutch  hospi- 
talities, but  which  could  not  be  indiscriminately  lavished  on 
strangers.  As  in  most  continental  universities,  members  were  ex- 
cused from  the  liability  of  oi'dinary  citizens  to  have  soldiers  billeted 
upon  them  in  case  of  siege  or  other  need,  to  take  their  turn  at  the 
night  watch,  and  to  contribute  to  public  works  or  fortifications  ; 
while  in  case  of  arrest  or  accusation,  they  were  free  from  the  ju- 
risdiction of  the  town  authorities.  All  these  were  matters  of 
great  advantage,  as  we  shall  see  presently.  Further,  the  hospi- 
tality of  the  Dutch  was  generously  bestowed  in  that  they  were 
made  the  recipients,  free  of  town  and  state  duties,  of  two  tuns  of 
beer  every  month  and  ten  gallons  of  wine  every  quarter ;  that  is, 
twenty-four  hogsheads  of  beer  and  forty  gallons  of  wine  every 
year.  As  tea  was  not  known  in  England  until  1610,  and  coffee 
until  1652,  and  the  word  "temperance,"  as  limited  to  the  matter 
of  drinking,  was  unknown  in  any  European  language,  the  use  of 
beer  or  wine  was  considered  a  necessity  at  the  table  by  both  Eng- 
lishmen and  Hollanders.  Think  of  twenty-four  hogsheads  of 
beer  and  forty  gallons  of  wine  to  each  one  of  the  Pilgrim  Univer- 
sity Fellows  !  And  yet  we  are  told  that  Dutch  hospitality  to  the 
Pilgrims  is  "  a  pleasing  fiction,"  "  a  fancy  in  the  face  of  history." 

4.  It  is  charged  that  "  during  all  the  residence  of  the  Pilgrims 
in  Holland,  the  conduct  of  the  Dutch  Government  towards  them 
was  modified  by  its  craven  fear  of  offending  his  High  Mightiness 
King  James  the  First  of  England";  and  that  it  was  "in  some 
measure  in  consequence  of  this  sharp  e3'e  kept  on  them  from 
England,  and  the  sensitiveness  of  the  Dutch  to  it,  that  our 
fathers  suffered  as  severely  as  they  did  in  Holland,"  etc. 

This  we  deny.  Charge  these  Dutchmen  of  this  heroic  age 
with  other  faults,  but  not  cowardice.  They  had  no  "craven 
fear"  of  either  the  Pope,  the  Devil,  Philip  II.,  or  James  I.  The 
exact  contemporaneous  words  of  Bradford,  quoted  by  the  critic, 
do  indeed  refer  to  the  caution  which  the  Dutch  took  to  avoid 
offending  their  Protestant  ally ;  for  Holland,  the  little  Protestant 
republic,  was,  like  another  David,  fighting  almost  alone  the  battle 


24 

of  liberty  against  giant  Spain.  Indeed,  the  Netherlands  republic 
was,  as  Principal  Fairbairn  so  eloquently  acknowledged  at  Ley- 
den,  fighting  England's  battle;  yes,  and  she  was  fighting  our 
battles,  too.  She  stood  for  Protestantism,  freedom,  toleration, 
humanity.  She  sorely  needed  England's  help  and  sympathy, 
just  as  in  our  days  of  war,  when  the  Alabama  was  about  to  be  let 
loose  from  British  port,  we  needed  both  in  our  struggle  with 
secession  and  slavery.  We,  too,  were  careful  not  to  give  oflensc 
to  England  during  our  Civil  War.  We  wanted  her  help.  We 
feared  not  with  the  coward's,  but  with  the  fear  of  a  brave  man 
who  knows  his  cause  is  just.  We  hesitated  to  displease  Great 
Britain,  but  we  had  not  for  a  moment,  any  craven  fear  of  her  : 
and  when  Charles  Francis  Adams  said  to  the  Qiieen's  representa- 
tive, "It  is  needless  to  remind  your  lordship  that  this  means 
war,"  he  had  fear,  but  neither  he  nor  we  had  any  "  craven  "  fear. 

So  the  Dutch  republic  of  which  Benjamin  Franklin  declared, 
"in  love  of  liberty,  and  bravery  in  the  defense  of  it  she  has  been 
our  great  example,"  had  no  craven  fear  of  King  James.  Both 
republics  of  united  States,  Dutch  and  American,  had  just 
exactly  that  kind  of  fear  which  the  Greeks,  using  the  word  only 
of  gods  and  heroes,  call  eulabeia.  Barneveldt  gave  this  royal 
coward,  pedant,  and  persecutor  to  understand  that  he  had  better 
mind  his  own  business,  and  let  Dutch  affairs  alone.  The  repre- 
sentative of  the  United  States  of  the  Netherlands  in  the  seven- 
teenth century  did  exactly  what  the  envoy  of  the  United  States  of 
America  did  in  1862.  For  the  life  of  the  republic  they  shrank 
not,  even  during  their  sti^uggle  for  life,  from  the  menace  of  war. 

5.  In  the  alleged  cases  of  the  Danish  professor,  Vorstius,  and  of 
Dr.  William  Ames,  of  Norfolk,  whotD  Young,  in  his  Chronicles 
of  the  Pilgrims,  mistakenly  imagines  were  deposed  and  perse- 
cuted by  the  Dutch  at  the  instigation  of  King  James  and  his 
minions,  the  facts  are  the  reverse  of  those  stated  and  repeatedly 
copied.  In  the  case  of  Conrad  V^orstius,  an  Arminian  in  oflice 
at  Ley  den  University,  it  was  tlie  Dutch  theologians  of  the  State 
church  who  deposed  him  from  his  professorship  on  account  of 
heresy,  and  the  Synod  of  Dort  that  banished  him.  In  any  event, 
having  made  King  James  umpire  in  the  dispute,  the  Dutch  con- 
trovertists  were  bound  to  abide  1  )y  the  imipire's  decision'.  The  per- 
secution of  Dr.  Ames,  the  military  chaplain  and  l*uritan  refugee, 


26 

Was  wholly  an  affair  of  the  English  church,  and  the  Dutch  had, 
so  far  as  known,  nothing  to  do  with  it.  Living  in  Leyden,  Sir 
Horace  Vere  made  him  chaplain,  but  the  English  Episcopalians 
forced  Vere  to  dismiss  him.  Without  asking  King  James'  per- 
mission the  Dutch  at  once  made  him  a  professor  at  Franeker,  and 
later  gave  him  a  pension,  and  chose  him  clerk  of  the  Synod  of 
Dort.  He  died  of  a  cold  contracted  after  a  flood  in  Rotterdam, 
profoundly  lamented  by  the  Dutch,  who  had  defied  King  James 
in  lavishing  honors  upon  him. 

Again,  and  again,  and  again  the  Dutch  went  contrary  to  King 
James'  will,  and  metaphorically  snapped  their  republican  fingers 
under  his  monarchical  and  heresy-smelling  nose.  So  far  from 
any  craven  fear,  these  Dutch  would  have  fought  the  Englishman 
as  well  as  the  Spaniard  and  the  Pope,  and  sunk  their  land  under 
the  waves,  rather  than  truckle  to  this  royal  enemy  of  the  Pilgrims. 

6.  It  is  stated  that  "when  the  Pilgrims  had  made  up  their 
minds  to  emigrate  to  the  New  World,  and  the  Dutch  made  them 
'large  offers'  to  settle  in  the  New  Netherlands  in  America,  their 
experience  had  been  such  that  they  do  not  seem  ever  seriously  to 
have  entertained  that  proposition,  but  'decided  not  to  meddle  with 
ye  Dutch.' " 

This  is  untrue.  The  facts  are,  that  John  Robinson  himself, 
Feb.  13,  1620,  first  made  the  proposition  to  the  Dutch  merchants 
of  Amsterdam  to  go  and  settle  in  the  New  Netherlands.  His 
purpose  was  much  larger  in  scope  than  the  later  enterprise  in  the 
Mayflower.  He  asked  for  Dutch  help,  promising  to  cross  the 
ocean  with  four  hundred  families  from  Leyden  and  England. 
Naturally,  however,  this  self-eflacing  pastor  and  far-seeing  states- 
man, as  well  as  accomplished  theologian,  wanted,  while  on  the 
new  continent,  military  protection  guaranteed  against  the  papist 
Spaniards. 

In  other  words,  the  experience  by  the  Pilgrims  of  the  Dutcli, 
and  of  the  hospitality  generously  bestowed  upon  them,  was  such 
that  they  wanted  to  go  under  the  order  and  protection  of  the  red, 
white,  and  blue  flag  of  the  United  States  of  the  Netlicrlands. 
These  are  facts  attested  by  the  Dutch  documents  at  Albany,  New 
York,  and  in  Brodhead's  and  Winsor's  Histories,  as  well  as  in 
Bradford's  own  testimony  of  "large  offers."  Unfortunately 
for  the  credit  of  early  New  England  historians,  these  facts  are 


26 

not  found  on  their  pages.  And  this  is  the  reason  why  some 
students  of  American  history  wlio  go  to  the  original  authorities, 
do  not  accept  as  the  final  verdict  of  history  the  defective  and 
distorted  statements  of  those  who  somehow  forget,  or  ignore, 
what  other  countries  beside  England  have  done  in  the  making  of 
our  nation. 

Why  did  not  the  Pilgrims  accept  the  liberal  offer  of  the 
Amsterdam  Company  of  free  cattle  and  transportation  to  the 
region  of  the  North  River?  For  one  reason,  and,  so  far  as 
records  show,  for  this  reason  alone.  It  was  the  year  1620. 
During  the  twelve  years  the  Pilgrims  had,  with  the  Dutch,  en- 
joyed profound  peace.  Now,  truce  with  Spain  was  to  end  next 
year,  1621,  and  the  little  republic  must  summon  all  her  resources 
against  the  mightiest  military  power  in  Europe.  As  Bradford 
says,  there  was  nothing  heard  on  all  sides  but  the  beating  of 
drums  and  preparations  for  war.  Hence,  the  States-General 
were  unable  to  guarantee  military  protection,  especially  in  the 
shape  of  two  ships  of  war  and  a  garrison  of  soldiers,  to  a  colony 
of  Englishmen  aci^oss  the  Atlantic.  They  could  not  even  pro- 
tect their  own  people,  the  colony  of  Dutchmen  and  Walloons 
proposed  by  Jesse  de  Forest;  though  later,  in  1623,  with  his 
company  of  fifty-six  Walloon  families,  he  was  able  to  lay  the 
foundations  of  the  Empire  State.  The  Pilgrims,  glad  as  they 
would  have  been  to  close  with  the  generous  response  of  the  Am- 
sterdam merchants  to  Robinson's  application,  must  have  foreseen 
what  answer  the  States-General  would  give  ;  and  so  they  had  to 
turn  from  fair  oflers,  and  accept  the  rigorous  terms  of  the  English 
Merchant  Adventurer's  Company,  which  kept  them  in  debt  and 
at  hardest  toil  for  several  years. 

7.  It  has  been  charged  that  Elder  Brewster  endured  persecu- 
tion for  "having  printed  some  Nonconformist  books  which  were 
unacceptable  to  the  English  hierarchy  ;"  that  "the  Dutch  govern- 
ment cowered  beneath  his  intimation  "  [of  Sir  Dudley  Carleton, 
the  British  minister  at  The  Hague],  "and  set  their  machinery  of 
law  at  work  to  arrest  the  elder  for  doing  what  he  liad  in  Holland 
a  perfect  right  to  do.  In  fear  of  Dutch  prisons  he  fled,  witli  all 
his,  and  seems  to  have  laid  low  in  England,  until  he  could  join 
the  exiles  on  the  Mayflower,  at  Southampton,  on  their  way 
home." 


t^^ 


27 

Answer.  These  statements  are  not  according  to  fact,  or  are 
distorted.  Nearly  the  whole  story  may  be  traced  in  Sir  Dudley 
Carleton's  "Letters."  Just  as  our  republic  gratefully  made  it 
possible,  during  a  generation  or  two,  for  "a  citizen  of  the  United 
States  [even  though  a  foreigner]  at  the  time  of  the  adoption  of 
this  Constitution,"  to  become  President  of  the  United  States,  so 
the  Dutch  honored  the  ambassador  of  their  Pi-otestant  ally  with 
a  pince  in  their  councils.  To  his  opinions  and  advice  they  gave 
as  much  deference  as  the  Continental  Congress  gave  to  the  sugges- 
tions of  Steuben  or  Lafayette  ;  but  they  never  for  a  moment,  as 
even  Sir  Dudley  Carleton's  letters  show,  "cowered  beneath  his 
intimation,"  or  that  of  his  master.  King  James.  At  his  request, 
in  December,  1619,  the  States-General  issued  a  "placart"  against 
indecent,  scurrilous,  scandalous  publications,  ten  months  after 
Brewster  had  left  Holland  for  England.  Further,  Elder  Brew- 
ster endured  no  persecution  whatever  from  the  Dutch.  He 
printed  as  many  Brownist  or  Congregationalist  books  without, 
so  far  as  we  know,  any  opposition.  There  is  no  proof  whatever 
that  Elder  Brewster  fled  to  England  in  fear  of  Dutch  prisons  ; 
but,  so  far  as  we  know,  went  of  his  own  accord,  with  his  family, 
in  February,  1619.  It  is  possible  that  he  never  saw  Southampton 
till  he  first  saw  it  from  the  deck  of  the  Speedwell.  It  is  more 
than  probable  that  he  returned  safely  and  untroubled  to  Leyden, 
late  in  1619,  and  was  with  the  Pilgrims  in  their  embarkation  at 
Delfshaven,  as  represented  in  Weir's  accurate  picture,  and  Pro- 
fessor Franklin  Dexter's  chapter  in  Winsor's  History. 

8.  It  has  been  said  that  while  searching  for  Brewster  at 
Leyden,  the  Dutch  constable,  through  a  confusion  of  names,  ar- 
rested Brewer.  Brewer,  who  was  a  fellow  of  the  University, 
had  been  associated  with  Brewster  in  the  printing  business.  It 
is  charged  that,  "Thus  caught,  Brewer  was  dealt  with,  and  after 
lying  a  long  time  in  prison,  his  types  being  seized  and  his 
property  confiscated,  he  was  sent,  under  guard,  home  to  England, 
to  be  dealt  with  by  the  government  there." 

To  any  one  familiar  with  Dutch  life  in  a  university  town  of 
this  period,  this  statement  causes  merriment.  Nevertheless,  it 
contains  a  fraction  of  the  truth.  The  facts  are  these  :  A  fiery 
Scotsman,  supposed  by  Cotton  to  have  been  the  Rev.  John 
Tarbes,  or,  as  is  more  probable,  David  Caldcrwood,  the  famous 


28 

champion  of  the  chinch  of  Scotland  and  opponent  of  King  James, 
had  published  a  violent  and  scurrilous  personal  attack,  virtually 
charging  the  king  w^ith  perjury.  This  involved  a  point  of  inter- 
national law,  and  under  the  treaty  between  Holland  and  England 
the  offender,  if  caught,  could  be  justly  extradited.  The  Dutch 
government  would  not  shelter  anarchists ;  theirs  was  libertv 
under  law.  Sir  Dudley  Carleton  suspected  that  Brewster  was 
the  printer  of  this  libelous  book,  of  which  there  is  no  proof.  By 
mistake  of  names  Brewer  was  apprehended.  Now  what  hap- 
pened.^ Brewer  was  not  cast  into  the  city  prison  ;  his  property 
was  not  confiscated  ;  he  was  not  sent  under  guard  as  a  prisoner  to 
England,  When  the  Universit}'^  officers  heard  of  the  British  min- 
ister's purpose  they  took  Brewer  under  their  own  charge,  English 
subject  though  he  was,  with  no  fear  of  King  James,  or  England, 
or  Sir  Dudley  Carleton  before  their  eyes.  They  then  demanded 
that  Brewer  should  go  as  a  member  of  the  University,  and  go  of 
his  own  accord  as  a  free  man,  to  London,  and  that  the  British 
ambassador  should  guarantee  his  safe  return,  and,  further,  pay 
all  his  expenses.  And  all  this  Sir  Dudley  Carleton  was,  to  his 
great  disgust,  obliged  to  do.  So  Brewer  went,  under  no 
bonds,  in  company  with  a  private  citizen,  enjoyed  the  picnic  to 
London,  and  came  back  scot  free  with  flying  colors,  much  to  the 
chagrin  of  Sir  Dudley  Carleton,  who  had  to  pay  the  bills.  It  is 
probable  that  Brewer,  and  all  the  Pilgrims,  who  at  the  first  fuss 
had  offered  to  go  Brewer's  bail,  doubtless  belie\ing  him  innocent, 
had  a  good  laugh  over  the  whole  affair  and  the  discomfiture  of 
King  James  and  his  envoy,  and  doubtless  with  admiration  for  the 
Dutch,  who  would  not  allow  themselves  to  be  insulted  even  by 
King  James.  It  is  even  probable  that  some  of  the  Dutchmen, 
along  with  the  fiery  Scotsman,  the  real  troubler  of  the  monarch, 
hugely  enjoyed  this  "twisting  the  British  lion's  tail." 

9.  Finally  it  is  alleged,  on  the  strength  of  a  piece  of  gossip  set 
forth  in  the  seventeenth  century,  fifty  years  after  the  event,  that 
the  Dutch  bribed  the  captain  of  the  Mayflower  to  take  the  Pil- 
grims to  Cape  Cod,  instead  of  to  the  Hudson  River. 

Answer.  Such  a  story  is  not  only  "incredible,"  as  Professor 
Franklin  Dexter  declares,  but  is  a  palpable  absurdity,  unworthy 
of  notice. 

Finally,  after  balancing  the  question  of  remaining  in  Holland 


29 

and  losins^  their  identity  as  Englishmen,  and  becoming-  absorbed 
in  the  Dutch  nation, — so  many  of  their  sons  marrying  Dutch 
wives,  antl  their  daughters  Dutch  men,  and  their  boys  entering 
the  Dutch  arm}-, — or  of  emigrating  to  America,  and  after  debating 
the  question  whether  to  risk  the  cruelty  of  the  red  Indians  or 
the  dark  Spaniards,  with  heroic  courage  and  sublime  faith  in  God, 
the  younger  and  stronger  portion  embarked  on  the  Speedwell,  to 
sufler  many  treacheries,  hardships,  and  sorrows  at  the  hands  of 
their  own  English  countrymen  before  landing  on  the  boulder  at 
Plymouth  to  begin  New  England. 

How  the  Pilgrims  really  felt  towards  the  Dutch  and  Holland, 
is  seen  in  the  genei'al  tone  of  the  records  they  have  left  behind 
them.  They  picture  their  poverty  and  lowly  estate,  for  their 
condition  was  hard.  There  are  criticisms,  also,  of  Dutch 
opinions  and  customs,  of  the  way  the  Sabbath  was  kept,  the  fact 
that  school  education  for  the  children  was  in  Dutch,  not  English, 
etc.  ;  but  not  in  all  their  writings  can  be  found  one  sentence  that 
can  be  tortured  into  an  expression  of  complaint  of  their  treat- 
ment by  the  Dutch  national  government,  by  the  authorities  of 
Leyden,  or  b}'  the  Dutch  people.  On  the  contrary,  we  have  two 
distinct  and  positive  expressions  of  acknowledgment  and  grati- 
tude by  Governor  Bradford,  penned  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic 
and  on  Massachusetts  soil.  Writing  to  the  Dutch  on  Manhattan 
Island  early  in  1627,  and  referring  to  the  alliance  between  Eng- 
land and  Holland,  he  says — and  remember  that,  as  Dr.  Dexter 
once  wrote,  "An  ounce  of  matter-of-fact  record  at  that  time  is 
worth  a  ton  of  the  rhetoric  of  to-day"  : — 

"Now,  forasmuch  as  this  [alliance]  is  sufficient  to  unite  us 
together  in  love  and  good  neighborhood,  in  all  our  dealings  ;  yet 
are  many  of  us  tied  by  the  good  and  courteous  entreaty  which  we 
have  found  in  your  country,  having  lived  there  many  years,  with 
freedom  and  good  content,  as  many  of  our  friends  do  this  day  ; 
for  which  we  are  bound  to  be  thankful,  and  our  children  after  us, 
and  shall  never  forget  the  same,  but  shall  heartily  desire  your 
good  and  prosperity  as  our  own  forever." 

Again,  Oct.  i,  1637,  Bradford  wrote  from  Plymouth  to  Man- 
hattan expi'essing  his  gratitude  and  sense  of  obligation,  "Ac- 
knowledging ourselves  tied  in  strict  obligation  unto  vour  country 
and  state  for  the  good  entertainment  and  free  liberty  which  we 


30 

had,  and  our  brethren  and  countrymen  yet  there  have  and  do  en- 
joy under  your  most  honorable  lords  and  states." 

Whatever  may  be  thought  now,  Bradford  did  not  believe  that 
Dutch  hospitalit}'  to  the  Pilgrims  was  "a  pleasing  fiction."  It  is 
true,  inifortunately  true,  that  some  good  inen,  professing  to  rep- 
resent the  Pilgrims,  have  tried  to  prove  that  Bradford  was  speak- 
ing the  language  of  politeness  only,  and  not  of  truth.  They  say 
he  was  diplomatic,  and  meant  what  he  said  only  in  the  sense  of 
modern  politics.  They  see  in  this  scene  only  the  bandying  of 
mutual  flattery. 

Well  might  the  Pilgrims  saj-,  "Save  us  from  our  friends."  In 
our  opinion,  such  explanations  blacken  the  character  of  noble, 
sincere  men.  The  Pilgrims  stir  our  souls  to  noblest  endeavor  to- 
day, because  we  believe  them  to  have  been  God's  men,  brave, 
simple,  sincere,  scorning  polite  lies.  No ;  Bradford,  who  had 
been  first  in  Holland,  and  in  all  probability  first  advised  the  Pil- 
grim exodus  thither,  spoke  truth  and  lied  not. 

Let  us  glance  now  at  the  influence  of  the  Dutch  Republic 
upon  that  great  multitude  of  Englishmen  who  lived  in  the  Nether- 
lands during  the  period  1580  to  1640,  mainly  from  whom,  and 
during  which  time,  New  England  was  settled.  Holland,  in  defy- 
ing Spain  and  the  Pope,  was,  during  her  eighty  years'  struggle, 
fighting  the  battle  of  Protestantism  and  religious  liberty  for  Eng- 
land as  well ;  and  England  knew  it.  One  reason  of  the  greatness 
of  the  British  Empire  to-day,  is  that  Holland  once  stood  as  her 
bulwark  against  Spain.  Hundred  of  English  merchants  were 
settled  as  traders  trading,  and  hundreds  of  English  volunteers 
were  fighting  in  the  Dutch  armies,  as  early  as  15S0;  but  it  was 
not  until  the  treaty  of  1585,.  six  years  after  the  United  States  of 
the  Netherlands  had  formed  their  union,  and  five  years  after  they 
had  published  their  declaration  of  independence,  that  large  bodies 
of  Englishmen  entered  the  Dutch  military  service  and  drew  Dutch 
pay.  From  1585,  Elizabeth  agreed  to  furnish  five  thousand 
foot  and  one  thousand  horse  for  thirteen  years.  In  addition  to 
these  six  thousand  men,  there  were  three  or  four  thousand  English 
volunteers  in  the  Dutch  armies.  After  the  truce  of  1609,  the 
year  the  Pilgrims  arrived,  the  Dutch  army  was  reduced  to  thirty 
thousand  men,  of  whom  five  thousand  were  English  or  vScottish. 
This  military  force  drew  with    it    large  numbers  of  merchants, 


81 

contractors,  students,  and  sending  men,  besides  the  chaplains,  and 
families  o/  officers  and  men,  swelling  the  average  total,  refugees 
and  adventurers  being  counted,  to  probabl)'  ten  thousand  people 
annually.  When,  in  149S,  the  English  merchants  were  expelled 
from  Stade,  in  Germany,  they  settled  first  at  Middleburg,  in 
Zealand,  where  Browne  went,  and  where  there  was  an  English 
Congregational  church  before  that  at  Amsterdam  or  Leyden. 
On  June  15,  1593,  as  we  find  from  the  Dutch  archives  there  were 
manufactories  of  English  cloth  situated  in  twelve  cities  of  the 
Netherlands  ;  viz.,  at  Dordrecht,  Haarlem,  Delft,  Gouda,  Leyden, 
Amsterdam,  Rotterdam,  Alkmaar,  Gorincham,  Enkhuysen,  and 
The  Hague.  During  the  Dutch  war  of  freedom,  there  were  in 
all  twenty-two  English  churches  in  the  Netherlands,  notices  of 
which  are  found  in  the  appendix  to  Steven's  "  History  of  the 
Scottish  Church,  Rotterdam."  Among  the  names  of  the  minis- 
ters and  chiuxh  officers,  are  those  of  several  who  afterwards 
became  famous  in  America. 

This  vast  number  of  Englishmen,  of  all  sorts  and  conditions, 
attracted  by  the  toleration,  prosperity,  or  military  or  commercial 
opportunities  of  the  little  republic,  continued  until  the  Dutch 
United  States  had  substantially  won  the  day.  By  1648,  Spain, 
exhausted  by  her  vain  task,  having  fertilized  the  ditches  of  Hol- 
land with  the  corpses  of  a  third  of  a  million  of  her  sons,  having 
learned  that  the  Dutchman's  "mines  above  ground"  were  more 
than  the  silver  lodes  of  Peru  and  Mexico,  acknowledged  the  in- 
dependence of  the  repviblic.  Long  before  this,  however,  the 
English  soldiers  and  most  of  the  merchants  had  returned  to  Eng- 
land, while  whole  congregations  of  aggressive  Presbyterians, 
Congregationalists,  Baptists,  Qiiakers,  and  other  Nonconformists, 
their  nei'ves  braced  by  republican  air,  and  faces  flushed  with  the 
consciousness  of  coming  success  at  home,  crossed  the  Channel  to 
cross  swords  also  with  King  Charles,  and  attempt  the  establish- 
ment of  a  commonwealth.  Surely  a  crop  of  dragon's  teeth  was 
sown  long  before  1640. 

Let  us  see  what  came  to  the  surface  in  the  four  years'  civil 
war. 

I.  The  eastern  and  southern  counties  were  Parliamentary  and 
republican, — the  eastern  counties  being  the  impregnable  fortress 
of  the  commonwealth ;  in  other  words,  the  counties  overrun  by 


82 

the  heretic  weavers,  brick-makers  and  brick-layers,  dike-builders 
and  land-drainers  from  the  Netherlands  in  the  fourteenth  century, 
and  only  two  or  three  i^enerations  before  by  the  Dutch  Protestants, 
and  where  tens  of  thousands  of  English  apprentices  had  been 
trained  in  the  homes,  and  in  the  ways,  and  thinking  of  Bible-reading 
men.  Thousands  of  English  children  with  one  or  more  Dutch 
parents,  and  thousands  of  grandchildren  helped  to  explain  what 
suddenly  came  to  the  surface  when  Parliament  and  king  crossed 
swords.  It  was  the  sons  and  grandsons  of  these  English  appren- 
tices who  formed  the  bulk  of  Cromwell's  army.  Further,  the 
man  who  trained  Cromwell  in  military  tactics  was  a  Hollander, 
Dalbier,  and  the  first  judge  advocate  of  the  Parliamentary  army 
was  Dr.  Dorislaus.  The  Ironsides  were  raised  and  trained  in  the 
Holland  districts,  and  a  Dutch  captain  was  the  Steuben  who 
drilled  these  militia  into  regulars  who  opposed  the  predecessor 
of  King  George.  Of  the  men  who  organized  the  Parliamentary 
forces,  Fairfax,  Essex,  Monk,  Warwick,  Bedford,  Skippon,  and 
others,  as  Masson  and  Carlyle  show,  were  trained  in  the  Nether- 
lands. 

Yet  the  English  Commonwealth  did  not  stand.  It  went  to 
pieces  within  fifteen  years.  Why.''  Because  England  was  not 
prepared  for  a  republic.  It  had  not  the  right  land  or  property 
laws,  the  right  jurisprudence,  popular  educational  system,  the 
right  local  and  national  spirit.  Feudalism,  the  worship  of  rank, 
the  power  of  the  State  church,  entail,  and  primogeniture  were  all 
against  a  republic. 

Yet  it  is  possible  that  if  the  reforms  proposed  by  the  commit- 
tee of  the  Long  Parliament  could  have  been  carried  out,  and  the 
preliminary  work  needed  for  a  republic  had  been  done  by  these 
reforms  put  in  action,  England  might  have  been  a  republic,  and  be 
leading  the  world  in  the  ideas  that  underlie  our  American  demo- 
cratic government.  John  R.  Green  says  that  for  the  last  two 
hundred  years,  in  a  tentative  way,  England  has  been  following 
out  the  Parliamentary  army's  scheme  of  political  and  social 
reform. 

Yet  where  were  the  precedents  obtained,  the  basis  of  these 
reforms  and  features  found  .f"  In  English  history,  in  the  English 
unwritten  constitution .''  No ;  they  are  not  there.  They  are 
almost  every  one  found  in  Dutch  history,  and  from  thence  are  they 


33 

taken.*  They  would  not  work  in  England ;  the  soil  was  not 
ready  for  the  seed.  Picked  men,  Englishmen, — not  average  men, 
but  morally  far  above  the  average,  and  trained  in,  or  influenced 
bv,  the  Dutch  republic, — brought  them  to  America.  Rejected 
of  England,  but  elect  and  precious  in  God's  sight,  they  introduced 
them  into  New  England.  Huguenots,  Quakers,  Baptists,  Scotch- 
Irish,  Germans,  Dutch,  brought  them  to  the  middle  and  southern 
colonies,  and  the  great  Teutonic  ideas,  vitalized  by  Christianity, 
took  root  on  American  soil,  and  their  fruit  is  the  republic  of  these 
United  States.  The  reforms  proposed  to  the  Parliament  of  the 
Commonwealth,  for  which  England  was  not  ready,  were  carried 
out  in  America  by  Englishmen  wlio  had  been  fired  with  Bible 
ideas.  To  them  the  Old  Testament  became  a  text-book,  but  the 
Protestant  republic  gave  them  visible  precedent  and  example. 
When  England  relapsed  into  monarchy, — that  is,  one-man  power, 
— and  Puritanism  slumbered  until  goaded  to  wrath  again  by  James 
II.,  then  again  the  men  of  England  looked  to  Holland.  They 
took  their  precedent  from  the  deposition  of  Philip  II.,  and  the 
cue  of  their  own  Declaration  of  Right  from  that  of  Holland's 
Declaration  of  Independence.  They  asked  the  Dutch  stadtholder 
to  cross  the  North  Sea  with  his  Dutch  regiments,  and  become 
William  III.  of  England. 

For  the  original  and  inspiration  of  England's  Magna  Charta 
of  1 688,  see  the  Dutch  Act  of  Abjuration  of  15S0,  and  put  the 
two  documents  side  by  side,  and  you  will  see  the  fomily  Hkeness. 
Chronology  and  style  will  show  which  is  the  father  and  which  the 
son.  When  the  immortal  document  signed  July  4,  1776,  is  made 
one  of  the  series,  its  genealogy  is  sound  and  sure  in  the  order, — 
Dutch,  English,  American. 

Let  us  turn  now  to  American  history,  and  see  whether  the 
Dutch  Republic  influenced  our  making.  Let  us  look  at  States 
and  groups  of  men.  All,  or  nearly  all,  the  military  leaders  of 
the  colonists  were  trained  in  the  Dutch  armies,  gaining  their 
experience  in  Holland's  fight  against  Spain — Miles  Standish  and 
Governor  Dudley  of  Massachusetts,  Lyon  Gardiner  of  Connecti- 
cut, Sir  Samuel  Argal,  Virginia,  Leisler  of  New  York,  and  many 
others  less  prominent. 

*  This  part  of  the  subject  here  glanced  at,  is  treated  at  length  in  Mr. 
Douglas  Campbell's  work,  "  The  Puritan  in  England,  Holland,  awd 
America." 


34 

Massachusetts  was  settled  by  men  educated  eleven  years  in  the 
Dutch  Republic,  in  1620.  Their  ten  years'  success  led  others  to 
come  over  and  settle.  It  was  the  men  trained  in  Holland  who 
made  the  Plymouth  settlement  a  success ;  for  the  best  emii^rants 
for  the  next  five  years  (or  until  John  Robinson  died),  as  Palfrey 
shows,  were  emigrants  from  Leyden.  Full  of  charitv,  kindliness, 
and  toleration,  their  minds  broadened  l)v  experience  in  a  land 
where  religion  was  free  to  all  men,  and  whose  people  respected 
the  rights  of  the  Indians  to  the  soil,  their  treatment  of  Roger 
Williams  the  radical,  and  of  Miles  Standisli  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic, was  in  marked  contrast  to  \\hat  men  who  differed  in  con- 
victions received  from  the  Puritan  immigrants.  Holland  was  one 
of  the  first  countries  to  cast  off  the  delusion  of  witchcraft, — the  first 
book  against  the  superstition  being  bv  a  Dutch  physician,  and  the 
Pilgrims  were  never  under  its  spell.  Reared  under  a  federal 
republic,  they  and  their  sons  led  in  the  formation  of  the  New 
England  Confederation,  of  1643.  Even  in  the  Mayflower's  cabin 
they  had  imitated  the  Netherlanders  in  having  a  written  compact 
for  their  government. 

Of  the  settlers  of  Massachusetts  beyond  the  old  colony,  five 
sixths  came  from  the  shires  of  England,  which  had  been  most 
profoundly  leavened  by  the  opinions  and  presence  of  the  Nether- 
lands refugees.  The  overwhelming  majority  of  the  early  minis- 
ters in  New  England  were  educated  at  Cambridge,  spending  their 
student  life  in  the  heart  of  the  eastern  counties.  In  scores  of  in- 
stances the  fmiily  cognomen  of  these  New  England  settlers  are 
only  Dutch  names  Anglicized,  and  a  considerable  strain  of  both 
Puritan  and  Pilgrim  blood  is  Dutch  blood. 

Connecticut,  it  is  believed,  is  the  typical  American  Common- 
wealth, being  even  more  democratic  in  origin  and  sturdy  main- 
tainence  of  independency  and  republican  principles  than  Massa- 
chusetts or  any  other  State,  having  the  first  regular  written  con- 
stitution ;  that  is,  a  signed  compact,  which  not  only  provided,  but 
prescribed,  a  definite  system  of  government.  In  tliat  instrument 
elections  were  ordered  to  be  by  secret,  written  ballot.  In  other 
words,  the  main  features  of  the  political  organization  of  Connecti- 
cut are  not  borrowed  from  England.  Arc  they  original  .'*  We 
answer,  that  between  the  details  of  the  early  political  methods  of 
Connecticut  and  of  the  Holland  states,  as  Ubbo  Iinmiius's  famous 


S5 

book  shows,  the  Hkencss  is  that  of  heredity.  No  place  in  the 
early  American  colonies  is  so  politically  like  a  bit  of  the  old  Dntch 
republic  as  Connecticut.  In  political  conii)lexion,  feature,  and 
detail,  in  town  representation,  le_<;"islatine,  C(nn"ts,  detail  of  parlia- 
mentary proceeding,  the  little  federal  republic  of  Connecticut  was 
a  close  copy  of  Friesland  or  Holland. 

The  hand  of  Thomas  Hooker,  the  Cambridge  graduate  driven 
out  of  England  to  find  refuge  in  Holland,  and  forced  to  cross  part 
of  the  ocean  as  a  stowaway,  is  distinctly  visible  in  the  first  Ameri- 
can written  constitution.  In  his  sermon  preached  before  the  in- 
strument was  framed,  the  great  preacher  laid  down  the  doctrine 
first  nationally  proclaimed  and  obtained  in  the  republic  under 
whose  flag  Hooker  had  lived  tluring  four  years, — that  "  the  founda- 
tion of  authority  [is]  laid  in  the  free  consent  of  the  people ; " 
"that  the  choice  of  public  magistrates  belongs  unto  the  people  by 
God's  own  allowance  ; "  that  "they  who  have  power  to  appoint 
ofiicers  and  magistrates,  have  the  right  also  to  set  the  bounds 
and  limitations  of  the  power  and  place  unto  which  they  call 
them."  Not  only  were  both  Hooker  and  Davenport,  the 
founders  of  Connecticut,  politically  educated  in  Holland,  but  so 
also  were  a  number  of  the  chief  men  associated  with  them  and 
leaders  of  the  emigration. 

What  of  Rhode  Island.^  It  was  settled  by  a  man  who, 
whether  ever  in  Holland  or  not,  is  not  known  ;  but  this  is  cer- 
tain,— he  was  a  fine  scholar  in  the  Dutch  language,  familiar  with 
Dutch  politics  and  history,  and  taught  the  poet  Milton  Dutch. 
He  studied  and  preached  in  the  region  of  England  overrun  by 
Dutch  Anabaptists  ;  he  was  extremely  beloved,  and  sheltered  by, 
the  Pilgrims.  He  was  banished  not  merely  for  theological  rea- 
sons, but  mainly  because  he  insisted  on  the  right  of  the  Indians 
to  the  soil,  and  believed  and  practiced  the  Dutch  doctrine  laid 
down  in  all  their  charters  and  steadily  carried  out,  of  buying  the 
land  of  the  natives  and  paying  for  it,  as  in  New  York,  and  New 
Jersey,  and  Pennsylvania,  and  Delaware,  before  occupation.  In 
Rhode  Island's  constitution  was  followed  the  precedent  of  tolera- 
tion set  by  Holland. 

To  sum  up,  then,  concerning  New  England,  the  men  who 
settled  it  put  in  operation  at  once  written  constitutions,  registra- 
tion of  deeds  and  mortgages,  common  schools,  and  written  ballots, 


36 

besides  other  things  having  no  precedent  in  England,  l)ut  known, 
practiced,  and  seen  by  men  in  a  republic.  In  other  words,  the 
life  of  English  Nonconformists  in  England  being  made  a  burden 
to  them,  and  toleration  being  refused  at  home,  the  colonists  to 
New  England,  numbering  twenty-one  thousand  men,  had  left 
their  native  land  before  1640  and  come  to  America,  thousands  of 
them  by  way  of  Holland.  These  settlers  were  not  average  Eng- 
lishmen. As  a  rule,  they  were  picked  men,  morally  and  spirit- 
ually. Many  of  them,  especially  their  leaders,  had  breathed  long 
and  deeply  the  air  of  ffeedom  in  a  republic,  and  so  carried  with  them 
to  the  virgin  soil  of  the  New  World,  the  best  English  traditions, 
reinforced  by  living  examples  and  precedents  of  a  Protestant, 
federal,  and  free  republic.  Hence,  in  settling  Massachusetts, 
Rhode  Island,  and  Connecticut,  they  did  not  reproduce  English 
social  or  political  life,  but,  by  a  noble  reversion,  they  re-erected 
on  American  soil  the  old  Teutonic  institutions,  and  they  copied 
largely,  with  improvements,  exactly  what  they  had  seen  in  opera- 
tion under  the  red,  white,  and  blue  flag  of  the  United  States  of  the 
Netherlands. 

Of  New  York,  the  Empire  State,  which  led  all  others  in  iu- 
risprudence,  constitutional  law,  and  political  influence  on  the 
nation,  it  is  enough  to  say  that  it  was  settled  by  the  Dutch,  who 
transferred  to  the  New  World  the  republican  principles  in  their 
fullness.  The  Dutch  in  America  were  not  pilgrims  or  refugees. 
They  had  no  need  to  be.  Their  Protestant  faith,  their  toleration, 
their  republicanism,  were  already  won.  Owing  to  an  act  of  British 
treachery,  committed  in  time  of  peace,  by  the  Stuart  King  James, 
in  1664,  like  the  seizure  of  Alsace-Lorraine  by  the  French  Louis, 
the  little  colony  of  seven  thousand  persons  in  the  New  Nether- 
lands had  but  forty-one  years  of  peaceful  development,  twenty- 
one  of  which  were  during  the  fatherland's  struggle  for  life  with 
Spain.  After  the  English  treachery  and  conquest  of  1664,  about 
one  half  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  New  Netherlands  returned  to 
the  Fatherland.  They  were  not  willing  to  live  under  the  rule  of 
that  king  whose  son  the  English  themselves  drove  out  twenty- 
four  years  later. 

The  Dutch  settlers  brought  with  them  something  else  than 
what  Washington  Irving  credits  them  with.  They  had  schools 
and  schoolmasters,  ministers  and  churches,  the  best  kind  of  land 


37 

l;nvs,  with  the  registration  of  drcds  and  mortgages,  toleration, 
the  habit  of  treating  the  Inthan  as  a  man,  the  written  ballot,  the 
village  community  of  freemen,  and  an  inextinguishable  love  of 
liberty  were  theirs.  They  originated  on  American  soil  many 
things,  usually  credited  to  the  Puritans  of  New  England,  but 
which  the  English  rule  abolished.  They  who  remained,  however, 
assisted  by  Huguenot,  Scotsman,  and  German,  though  in  a  con- 
quered province,  fought  the  battle  of  constitutional  liberty  against 
the  royal  governors  of  New  York  night  and  day,  and  inch  by  inch, 
until,  in  the  noble  State  constitution  of  1778,  the  victory  of  1648 
was  re-echoed.  "Having  no  royal  charter,  the  composite  people 
of  New  York,  gathered  from  many  nations,  but  instinct  with  the 
principles  of  the  free  republic  of  Holland,  were  obliged  to  study 
carefully  the  foundations  of  government  and  jurisprudence.  It 
is  true  that  in  the  evolution  of  this  commonwealth  the  people 
were  led  by  the  law}'ers  rather  than  by  the  clergy.  Constantly 
resisting  the  invasion  of  royal  prerogative,  they  formed,  on  an 
immutable  basis  of  law  and  right,  that  Empire  State  which,  in  its 
construction  and  general  features,  is,  of  all  those  in  the  Union, 
the  most  t)-pically  American.  Its  historical  precedents  are  not 
found  in  a  monarchy,  but  in  a  republic.  It  is  less  the  fruit  of 
English  than  of  Teutonic  civilization."* 

Pennsylvania's  part  in  the  making  of  the  American  Union  is 
not  the  least.  Her  foundations  were  laid  in  brotherly  love  to  the 
Indians,  and  to  men  of  all  creeds,  in  prayer,  in  faith,  in  profound 
trust  in  God,  as  truly  as  was  Massachusetts  or  Connecticut.  Hers 
was  one  of  the  most  liberal  of  all  the  colonial  constitutions.  All 
faiths  were  tolerated,  even  Roman  Catholic.  Church  and  state 
were  separate.  William  Penn  changed  prisons  from  nurseries  of 
vice  to  models  of  reformatoi'y  and  penal  institutions ;  taught 
orphan  children  trades,  and  gave  persons  wrongfully  accused  of 
crime  damage  against  the  prosecutor.  To  Pennsylvania  came 
the  persecuted  of  many  countries  as  to  a  holy  land  of  peace. 
Here  was  raised  the  first  ecclesiastical  protest  against  slavery; 
and  here  the  first  book  in  America  condemning  it  was  written. 
Here,  also,  was  printed  the  first  Bible  in  a  European  tongue,  the 
first  treatise  on  the  philosophy  of  education,  the  largest  and  most 

*  Preface  to  the  author's  "  Sir  William  Johnson  and  the  Six  Nations," 
in  the  series,  "  Makers  of  America." 


;i?948l 


38 

sumptuous  piece  of  colonial  printing  ;  and  here  was  the  first  liter- 
ary center  and  woman's  college  established,  in  America.  Penn- 
sylvania led  off  in  establishing  the  freedom  of  the  press,  in  reform 
of  criminal  law,  in  reform  of  prisons,  in  awarding  to  accused 
persons  the  right  of  counsel  for  defense.  In  proportion  to  her 
numbers,  Pennsylvania  lost  more  men  than  any  other  Northern 
State  during  the  Civil  War  for  freedom.  In  not  a  few  features 
now  deemed  peculiarly  American,  besides  that  of  honoring  the 
Lord's  day,  the  State  founded  by  William  Penn  is  (despite  con- 
temporary politics),  the  land  of  first  things,  and  the  shining 
example. 

Well,  who  was  William  Penn  ?  He  was  the  son  of  a  Dutch 
mother,  Margaret  Jasper,  of  Rotterdam.  Dutch  was  his  native 
language,  as  well  as  English.  He  was  a  scholar  versed  in  Dutch 
law,  history,  and  religion.  He  preached  in  Dutch,  and  won 
thousands  of  converts  and  settlers,  inviting  them  to  his  Christian 
commonwealth.  He  himself  wrote  the  grand  Constitution  of 
Pennsylvania.  Were  his  precedents  taken  from  English  law.'' 
No!  While  writing  that  instrument  he  lived  in  Embden, — the 
oldest  known  home  of  the  written  ballot,  and  one  of  the  cities 
of  refuge  to  the  English  Protestant  refugees, — with  the  laws  of 
Friesland,  the  old  home  of  the  Anglo-Saxons,  and  one  of  the  first 
states  of  the  Dutch  Republic,  daily  before  his  eyes. 

Time  would  fail  to  tell  of  all  the  vitalizing  influences,  direct 
and  indirect,  of  the  Dutch  Republic  upon  ours.  These  can  be 
clearly  discerned,  not  only  in  colonial  times,  but  also  in  the 
revolutionary  and  constitution-making  epochs.  Was  it  not  a  kind 
Providence  which  so  laid  the  foundation  stones  of  our  national 
history,  that  the  tolerant  Dutch  and  the  peaceful  Quakers  were 
placed  between  Puritan  and  Cavalier,  between  Long  Island  Sound 
and  Mason  and  Dixon's  line,  until  Old-World  feuds  were  swallowed 
up  in  the  grander  issue  of  the  American  Revolution.''  Can  we 
forget  how  little  Holland,  first  after  France,  recognized  our 
national  independence,  and  showed  her  faith  in  us  during  our 
dark  days  by  a  loan  of  fourteen  millions  of  dollars.''  When  after 
the  Revolutionary  war,  Americans  were  searching  all  history  for 
precedents  and  examples  of  republican  government,  to  what 
nation  in  ancient,  mediaeval,  or  modern  times  did  they  look  most 
closely,  and  copy  more  directly,  than  Holland  and  her  republic, 
profiting  by  her  faults  and  her  costly  experiences. 


39 

Well  do  the  English  critics  who,  in  recent  years  only,  since  re- 
publics were  made  respectable  in  their  eyes  by  the  success  of  our 
Ci\il  War,  study  us,  say  that  the  political  writings  of  the  framers 
of  the  American  Constitution  show  minute  familiarity  with  Dutch 
history,  while  the  political  experience  of  England  has  not  been 
drawn  upon.  Well  wrote  Washington  to  Professor  Luzac,  of 
Leyden,  the  famous  professor  of  history,  editor,  and  writer  on 
republican  principles,  and  political  teacher  and  correspondent  of 
Washington,  Jeflerson,  and  John  Adams,  and  later  the  instructor 
of  John  Qiiincy  Adams,  "America  is  under  great  obligation  to 
the  writings  of  such  men  as  you."  Still  more  direct  testimony 
to  the  influence  of  the  Dutch  Republic  on  the  American  Revolu- 
tionary leaders  and  makers  of  our  national  Constitution  is  fur- 
nished by  Franklin,  who  wrote,  "In  love  of  liberty  and  bravery 
in  the  defense  of  it,  she  [Holland]  has  been  our  great  example." 
Alexander  Hamilton  and  John  Jay,  authors  of  "The  Federalist," 
and  so  prominent  in  the  formation  of  our  national  government, 
were  closely  allied  by  marriage  to  the  Dutch  families  of  New 
York,  and  to  them,  as  to  Madison,  the  father  of  the  Constitution, 
the  story  of  Holland's  struggle  and  experience  was  as  a  household 
tale.  "  The  Federalist"  and  their  other  writings  show  how  well 
they  utilized  their  knowledge,  and  how  largely  they  drew  upon 
the  political  experience  of  the  United  States  of  Holland. 

Were  time  and  space  given,  it  could  be  here  clearly  shown 
that  we  are  less  an  English  nation  than  composite  of  the  Teu- 
tonic peoples  ;  the  result  of  the  whole  continental  movement  of 
the  sixteenth  century,  when  the  Bible  and  printing  became  the 
property  of  the  common  people.  In  our  American  common- 
wealth the  features  enumerated  below  were  not  derived  from 
England,  but  were,  in  germ,  or  directly,  borrowed  from  the 
Netherlands  Republic.  We  inherit  the  best  spirit  of  the  Roman 
empire,  and  of  the  Teutonic  principles,  vitalized  by  Christianity, 
and  the  nations  of  the  earth  now  borrow  more  from  us  than  we 
from  them.  The  main  features  of  the  American  commonwealth 
are  : — 

1.  The  principle  that  "all  men  are  created  equal." 

2.  Separation  of  church  and  state. 

3.  Our  land  laws,  with  the  system  of  registration  of  deeds 
and  mortgages. 


40 

4"  Local  self-government,  from  the  town  meeting  to  the  "  gov- 
ernment of  governments"  at  Washington. 

5.  Written  constitutions  prescribing  and  limiting  the  powers 
of  rulers  and  departments  of  government. 

6.  Our  State  governors  and  national  President,  the  Stadt- 
holders  of  States  and  United  States. 

7.  Our  State  Senates  and  national  Senate,  or  States-General 
of  sovereign   States. 

8.  Our  Supreme  Court,  and  the  supremacy  of  the  judiciary. 

9.  Our  common-school  system. 

10.  Freedom  of  religion. 

1 1 .  Freedom  of  the  press. 

12.  The  secret,  written  ballot. 

13.  Reform  of  criminal  law. 

14.  Prison  reform. 

i^.   The  office  of  District  Attorney. 

16.  The  right  of  counsel  for  defense. 

17.  The  amalgamation  of  law  and  equity  in  codes. 

iS.  Reform  in  the  laws  concerning  the  rights  of  married 
women. 

It  is  less  needful  for  me  to  enter  into  detail  and  proofs  of  the 
claims  here  made,  since  one  more  able  and  better  versed  in  his- 
tory and  law,  an  American  lawyer,  Douglas  Campbell,  has 
wrought  out  the  argument,  and  his  work  will  soon  be  published. 

It  has  been  my  piupose  in  this  paper  only  to  supplement  the 
ordinary  story  of  English  and  American  history  by  furnishing  an 
omitted  chapter.  How  far  I  may  have  succeeded,  you  must  be 
judges.  This  much,  however,  I  believe  ;  viz.,  that  your  proposi- 
tion to  erect  at  Delfshaven  some  durable  token  of  American 
appreciation  of  both  hosts  and  guests,  Hollander  and  Pilgrim,  is 
one  worthy  of  praise,  honor,  and  support  by  all  Amei^icans  who 
honor  alike  the  principles  and  the  founders  of  the  older  and  the 
younger  republic.  In  believing  that  Gov.  W^illiam  Bradford,  in 
1627,  spoke  the  truth  and  lied  not,  when  acknowledging  so  un- 
stintingly  tlie  kindness  of  Holland  and  the  Dutchmen,  he  said, 
"for  which  we  are  bound  to  be  thankful,  and  our  children  after 
us,"  you  are  vindicatmg  them  from  the  sectional  or  sectarian  pre- 
judice that  dwarfs  the  character  of  both. 


ITKUit-   <Ai» 


vr;- 


—  /    ; 


ADOPTED  AT  THE  REGULAR  MEETING  OP 
THE  CONGREGATIONAL  CLUB  OF  BOSTON. 
MASS..  MONDAY.  24TH  FEBRUARY.  1890. 


nOJ^eteftB,  Remembering  the  hospitality  of  the  free  republic  of  Holland 
so  generously  bestowed  upon  the  Pilgrims,  who,  after  twelve  years  resi- 
dence in  Amsterdam  and  Leyden,  sailed  from  Delfshaven  on  a  voyage 
which  was  completed  at  Plymouth  Rock,  it  is  fitting  that  we,  members  of 
Congregational  Clubs  throughout  the  L^nited  States,  should  unite  in  grate- 
ful recognition  of  Dutch  hospitality,  and  at  Delfshaven  raise  some  durable 
token  of  our  appreciation  of  both  hosts  and  guests, —  calling  upon  all 
Americans  who  honor  alike  the  principles  and  the  founders  of  the  two 
republics  to  join  in  the  enterprise.     Therefore  be  it 

^CBoftjeb,  That  the  Club  heartily  approves  of  the  erection  of  such  a 
commemorative  monument,  and  that  the  Rev.  William  Elliot  Griffis, 
D.D.,  Mr.  Hamilton  A.  Hill,  Mr.  William  O.  Grover,*  the  Rev. 
Arthur  Little,  D.D.,  and  Mr.  Thomas  Weston,  be  a  committee  in 
behalf  of  this  Club  to  act  with  full  power  in  conjunction  with  committees 
of  other  Congregational  Clubs,  and  of  any  other  appropriate  organizations, 
to  obtain  the  necessary  funds,  and  to  secure  the  erection  of  such  a 
memorial. 

Charle.s  Carleton  Coffin, 

President. 


(^ffeBf: 


M.  M.  Cutter, 


Secretary. 


Send  ail  contributions  to  Mr.  Frank  Wood,  352  Washington  Street, 
Boston,  Mass.,  and  receipts  will  be  sent.  No  money  to  be  expended  until 
a  national  association  is  formed,  but  held  in  trust  for  the  purpose. 

*Mr.  Grover  being  unable  to  serve,  Mr.  Krank  AVood  was  appointed,  Marcli  27th, 
in  his  place. 


UNlVEKSlTJf  01  UAi^iruKiv 
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